Child of the Fox
by Ignisami
Summary: Treachery leads to Discovery. With new knowledge about his past, what will Naruto do about the threats that endanger the Elemental Nations from within AND without?
1. Origins revealed

**Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. **

**I wrote this in between sessions of working on The Ancients From Alchera and studying. Enjoy and please leave reviews!**

**Child of the Fox**

The first time Naruto encountered the voice was when he was three.

An elderly woman was chasing him with a thick branch held in her hand, easily capable of doing his three-year old frame harm. She thought he was stealing food from her son-in-law's stand in the Konoha market and decided to teach him a lesson. She never stopped to consider that it wasn't stealing if he caught it in mid-air as the son threw the loaf of bread in the trash. The son definitely didn't, seeing as he looked Naruto right in the eye, nodded, and then looked away, thoroughly confusing the young boy.

It was probably a sad testament to the boy's life so far that he was capable of keeping pace, even outrunning an angry adult fifty-eight years older than he was, even if she was an out-of-practice civilian with bad knees.

It was an even sadder testament to the lives of both that the adult was losing her breath faster than the three year old child. Granted, part of it was genetic. The Uzumaki clan, to which the child belonged, had always been known for the massive stamina of its members. As she was losing ground on the rather steep slope of a hill in one of Konoha's many parks, the woman decided to take a last swing at the blonde child. Naturally, the child didn't agree with the woman's intent to bash his brain in, and dove to avoid such a fate. He had miscalculated how far from the edge he was, however, and tumbled down the hill clutching his bread in his right arm. The woman had overbalanced on her swing and fell down the other side of the path, completely missing Naruto leaping over the edge with an arm crossed in front of his face, the loaf of bread still clutched in the other arm. When the woman failed to spot the 'demon brat' after she had arisen from her crumpled state on the ground, she huffed, threw the stick to the side, and slowly ambled towards her son-in-law's stand.

Tumbling down the slope of the hill, Naruto tried to stop himself, using his left arm and his legs as brakes, but he was simply going too fast for his weak body to stop. His ankle twisted because of the sheer speed of his small frame, and a rock scraped his arm as he saw a tree get closer and closer...

"_**Curl up and roll!"**_ a mysterious voice urged. Naruto wanted to look around for the source of the voice, but he was preoccupied with falling down the hill. Not that there _was_ anything around him.

Naruto did exactly that and tucked his limbs in tightly. This action had its own downsides, however, as the roll caused him to speed up, hurtling toward the tree at the base of the hill at a faster pace than before, eventually slamming into the tree with his back, blacking out from the pain.

Later that day, after being released from the hospital following a few questions from his jiji, the Sandaime Hokage of Konohagakure no Sato, he wondered what the voice had been and if it had been his imagination.

– – – –

The second, and third, time Naruto encountered the voice, he was eight and had been at the Konoha Shinobi Academy for two years.

He'd been minding his own business, mostly, walking around town plotting pranks. He'd done some observation on the stuck-up Hyūga – though to Naruto they were just 'the clan with weird pale eyes' –, intent on finding a way to dye all their clothing orange and, hopefully, hang the underwear around town.

As he was walking, his brain was so focused on finding holes in the Hyūga security that he failed to notice that he had been led into a side-alley a ways away from the main thoroughfare of Konoha through a set of very subtle – to a first year Academy child – genjutsu.

"_**Dodge right!"**_the unknown voice suddenly shouted. He was so absorbed in his plotting that he almost didn't react in time, and paid the price when a kunai found its way into his shoulder. It was better than the knife landing in his chest as the thrower had intended, but not by a whole lot. Through the pain, Naruto missed a voice berating another for almost robbing them of their chance to pay it back for everything.

The next moment, Naruto was hit on the back of his head and blacked out.

When he came to, he was in an abandoned apartment in the slums of Konoha, close to where his own apartment was after jiji gave him permission to live on his own at age five.

"What's going on?" he had shouted to the throng of villagers surrounding him, including a few with freaky red eyes. He could see that they had various weapons with them; daggers, pitchforks, kunai, torches... he didn't like the implications of the weapons with his bound body in an abandoned, out-of-the-way apartment in the village. He wasn't the brightest light around, but he was far from an idiot. An idiot would not have lived even a single day in his shoes.

"We're getting payback, demon!" one of them shouted. Naruto's brow furrowed, what in the name of Inari-sama were they talking about? He wasn't a demon! And, payback for what? His pranks? He made sure that the pranks were humiliating as pranks should be, but never dangerous. Dye in clothes, paint bombs, pheromones around compounds to drive the Inuzuka dogs into a mating frenzy, clothes strewn around the village... that sort of thing.

So why payback? "But I didn't do anything!" he yelled back. Strangely, they didn't seem to appreciate this, only growing more angry.

"Don't fool us demon, you killed my parents and wife!" the same man had shouted.

"And my sister!" another added. Soon, everyone was shouting their grievances against him, most of which revolved around him killing some members dear to him. That was absurd, he would remember it if he killed people, wouldn't he?

The mob worked itself into a frenzy and soon moved to strike him over and over again with the blades. Some of them took great delight in tormenting the child by holding the burning torches to his torso. For some reason, they stayed away from his face.

"_**Flare your chakra as high as it can go!"**_ the mysterious voice urged. He tried to comply, for he knew that flaring his chakra made his jiji appear ever since he had accidentally flared it too high during leaf-sticking practice and jiji came teleporting in with a squad of the black-clad masked ninja. He briefly wondered how the voice knew what would happen when he flared his chakra, but it was swiftly dismissed by the raw pain inflicted by the villagers.

It was hard, though. He still required a bit of concentration to flare his chakra and the mob wouldn't let up their stabbing and burning for five seconds so he could focus and flare. As if the gods were listening, the mob soon stepped back to admire their handiwork. The young child's body was littered with swiftly-healing cuts, bruises, and blackened areas all around. In a fit of sadism, they even cut away that which made him a man. It'd regrow within an hour because the only things his regeneration _couldn't _heal were destroyed lungs, heart, and brain because he'd be dead before the regeneration could do its job. Everything else still kept his body functioning well enough for long enough that the regeneration was granted enough time to regrow everything.

Unknown to anyone outside the seal, the intelligence powering the regeneration was especially adept at regrowing that particular part of the male anatomy, having been thoroughly introduced to it by the few humans that wormed a way into her heart and having become quite fond of it as a result.

He grit his teeth and grasped the moment of respite to raise his chakra as high as it could go. Unbeknownst to the child, however, he did not _flare_ his chakra, he _pulsed_ his chakra. The difference between the two as far as noticeability goes is minimal, but there is one key difference in their effect. Flares are fully internal while pulses are external projections of chakra. This particular pulse was dense enough that the civilians fainted on the spot – an achievement even for people with demons sealed inside them – while the few shinobi with freaky red eyes started screaming and clutching at their eyes. The pulse travelled outward and washed over half of Konoha, dispelling various genjutsu that kept people's vanity intact or hidden entrances obscured. Neither visiting nobles or ANBU were all that pleased with events, though the latter just saw it as yet another revealed flaw in their security; even if the pulse was rather large and powerful, ANBU-level genjutsu, especially those obscuring the entrance to their headquarters, were supposed to be sturdier than that.

"Naruto-kun!" the aged leader of the village called out upon seeing the mess that was the apartment. He strode over to the young blonde lying in a bloody mess on the floor and vowed that the ones responsible would pay. '_Naruto-kun, I have well and truly failed you.' _

"ANBU, why are they screaming?" he asked. Surely a chakra pulse couldn't do that or it would be used more often in the ninja life.

Bakeneko, the only one of this squad proficient in medical jutsu, kneeled next to a villager and ran a diagnostic. "The civillians have been knocked out by a dense wave of chakra, similar to what is employed for knocking out unruly patients, except on a larger scale," she replied, her voice muffled by the mask. "As for the Uchiha... the readings show they had their eyes active when the pulse hit them. It's not hard to imagine what happened." Without prompting, she continued, "there no sign of Kyūbi-chakra anywhere, Hokage-sama."

The Hokage hummed. This was good news as he could pretend that the ANBU were the ones that disabled these villagers. Despite the presence of several Uchiha, it was a story that would be believed. At least, it would as soon as he mentioned the ANBU.

"What went on in this room is hereby classified. The official story will be that we felt the pulse and flickered into the apartment, after which we disabled everyone and invited them to the courtesy of T&I," he said, emphasizing that this was not to leave the persons gathered in the room. He didn't necessarily need to give the ANBU the official story after classifying it, but he always held the belief that subordinates that knew a little of what was going on were less annoying subordinates, as well as less likely to go rogue as they felt included in the workings of the village. It could backfire spectacularly of course, as the Orochimaru situation had exhibited, but on the whole it worked splendidly. It never hurt to periodically reinforce that some things were to _remain _secret, however. "Anyone gathered here discussing with others what went on in this apartment that clashes with the official story will find themselves a... _personal guest_ of Mitarashi Anko, with instructions for her to go all out."

The gathered ANBU couldn't help but shiver. Mitarashi Anko was recovered only a year ago from the clutches of Orochimaru's lab in Umi no Kuni, but the sadism the newest Assistant Head of the Torture and Investigations department displayed was already legendary, though her promotion so soon after she returned from the clutches of Orochimaru ruffled numerous feathers... but no one could deny she was _bad_ at the job. _No one_ wanted to become a guest of an Anko with carte blanche to do whatever she wanted. Death was preferable.

"Hai, Hokage-sama!" the four half-yelled, breaking the ANBU's vaunted professionalism and stoicism from the mere suggestion of spending quality one on one time with Anko.

The aged Hokage nodded, satisfied that he had impressed upon them the need to keep this silent. "As far as these..." he trailed off, looking for the right word. "_Creatures_, are concerned; tell Anko and Ibiki that they have carte blanche to do what is necessary to find out how deep this goes, I doubt these forty did something like this on their own. If it's needed, they can order Inoichi out of retirement. I'll put it in writing when I get to my office, after I drop Naruto-kun off at the hospital."

They nodded to show their understanding and the five flickered out as one, each carrying one or two persons as cargo. The only one of those carried out that was not screaming was an unconscious eight year old.

As the Hokage flickered into his office from the hospital a few minutes after having dropped Naruto off, leaving the child in the care of the most trustworthy doctor he knew, he heaved a sigh of relief. The wounds were mostly superficial, with the exception of the castration that was already miraculously beginning to regrow, and apparently the Kyūbi chakra was adept at healing even third-degree burns for the large blackened welts were shrinking as he watched.

He sat down at his desk and started to put the orders that would hopefully change Konoha forever to paper.

– – – –

The day it all made sense, Uzumaki Naruto was twelve and had just failed the graduation exam for the third time.

Life for the blonde Jinchūriki had improved following the ambush at his apartment. As it turned out, the emergency council session to address civilian issues in Konoha that was interrupted by the child's chakra pulse felt over practically the entire village was part of a conspiracy to remove the Jinchūriki from this life. Three days later, ninja clan involvement became apparent and the Hokage ordered a Yamanaka mind-walk for the _entire _shinobi force, ANBU included. Refusal of the mind-walk was met with summary execution after the memories were forcibly extracted anyway. In other circumstances this may have been a bit extreme, but Naruto's continued existence was practically all that prevented another Hyūga Affair or full-blown invasion by Kumo or Iwa. They could not afford to take chances. Civilians and civilian-born ninja still didn't particularly _like_ the Jinchūriki, but they now knew better than to mistreat him, deny him basic necessities, or overcharge him for anything. They just tried to find different, more subtle ways to kill the child. Naruto was almost perpetually unwell, though never truly _sick_, for the first year following the situation at the abandoned apartment.

On a seemingly random note, the list kept by the hospital titled 'Poisons Uzumaki Naruto has Ingested' exploded with new entries following the attack on the eight-year old child, though these new entries were not, unlike the ones on the list up to that point, accidental ingestions.

This particular day, a brilliant Monday in May on which the greatest mystery surrounding the child's life would be revealed, started as many other Academy days did. That is, Uzumaki Naruto slept through his alarm clock and woke up ten minutes before he was supposed to leave for the Academy, instead of the planned thirty.

Unlike most other days, Naruto was tense. Today was the day of his third graduation attempt, and if he failed to pass today he would be kicked from the shinobi program. Naruto was oblivious to the fact that neither the Hokage, the ANBU General, nor the Elders would allow the village's Jinchūriki to remain untrained, not knowing that as the village's Jinchūriki. Naruto not passing his third exam simply meant that he would disappear into the shadowy bowels of ANBU before emerging years later as a jōnin.

He ran into the classroom, greedily sucking in air, exactly one minute before the test was about to begin.He had paid the price for his relative tardiness, as he usually was present ten minutes before the start of the day, by seeing his usual chair near Uchiha Sasuke – a stuck-up prick but he liked to think that there was some form of rivalry going on between them – taken by a girl with long blonde hair three shades paler than his own. Sasuke expressed his dissatisfaction with his tardiness by aiming a very intense glare at him.

He flinched slightly from the intensity of the glare and looked around the classroom for an empty seat. There were three left; one at the back row between Kiba and Shikamaru, one near the middle between two civilians he didn't know, and one at the window next to that girl with the weird pale eyes that always fainted whenever he approached her. He was _fairly_ sure it wasn't something malice-induced, but it was unsettling regardless. He strode over to the window, at least he'd not be distracted by the not-so-subtle killing intent from the civilians, as minimal as it was, children from those who never got over their hatred of him despite the executions, or the general air of laziness emanating from Shikamaru which was sure to affect his eventual score.

The girl's cheeks turned red as he sat in the chair next to her, thoroughly confusing Naruto. Was she all right? It would be bad for her if she had a fever the day of the exam, wouldn't it?

Before he could voice his concern a loud bang resounded through the room, the poor door thrown open by their teacher and his assistant, Iruka-sensei and Mizuki-sensei, both unusually tardy as well. The chatter in the class died down immediately without Iruka-sensei having to perform his trademark technique, often named the 'Big Head no Jutsu' by students and teachers alike.

"Good morning students," Iruka-sensei greeted, receiving a chorus of 'hello' and 'good morning Iruka-sensei' in return. He grabbed an armful of paper and moved through the class to place a copy of the exam on their desks. "Today is Examination Day, as you all know. The test is split into several parts; the written portion, taijutsu, an obstacle course, weapons, and jutsu. The Basic Three will be asked. Additional jutsu may earn extra credit if performed correctly. All areas grant a base maximum of one hundred points each, and a minimum of four hundred and twenty-five points is required for a pass with no single section below eighty points."

Naruto slumped, eyes downcast. He was sure he'd be able to pass the written portion this time, but the damned Bunshin held him up every time. If he knew two extra jutsu his failure to perform the Bunshin would bring his score down to four out of five, rather than two out of three. Eighty versus sixty-six. He'd managed to get the instructions for two jutsu available to Genin, the **Suiton: Teppōdama **and the **Fūton: Daitoppa**, but he suspected that the person who had given them to him was hoping he'd kill himself with them, as had nearly happened the first time he tried the Daitoppa. He had the Teppōdama down after two months – water came so much easier to him that wind for some reason – and a lot of effort, but if he flunked the Bunshin it'd hardly matter. HE didn't think that flunking one of the base requirements and replacing it with a single extracurricular jutsu – even if perfectly performed – was going to make him pass. If only he'd managed to get the Daitoppa down.

Even if he aced everything else, he would likely fail again. Iruka-sensei may have warmed up to him over the last three years but he was a stickler for the rules. 475 out of 500 points, well above the minimum 425 required to pass, but one category was only 75 instead of the minimum 80? Sorry, you fail.

"You have two hours, you may begin," Iruka-sensei said. Sighing softly to himself, he started writing.

The exam itself was only five sheets of paper, though both sides were printed. Very few people figured out the trick to getting a perfect score to this exam that covered Konoha history, mathematics, shinobi code and conduct, chakra and jutsu theory, and a host of other subjects they'd covered over the years. The trick was to answer in the same style as the question. If the question was polite and/or formal, full credit was only given for a polite and/or formal answer. Likewise with rude and/or informal questions.

It was just one more way of looking beneath the surface, a very popular phrase around the Shinobi Academy, and indeed Konoha as a whole, ever since Hatake Kakashi's mandatory year-long stint as a teacher three years ago; the ability to read a situation, preferably in little time. In this case that situation was politeness and formality, a skill that would be invaluable if they were hired as an escort for nobles. Most clients in general responded better to a shinobi that matched their own mannerisms. There was flattery in imitation, and most clients responded well to such. A happy client meant more business, and business was the name of the shinobi game.

"You have five minutes remaining," came Iruka's voice suddenly just as he was finishing the last question. He smiled grimly; if he aced everything but the Bunshin he may appeal to jiji to set him a replacement task for merit promotion. He'd intended to do so last year, but only got 85 points on the written exam, 66 on the jutsu, and full marks on everything else. To be eligible for a replacement task for merit promotion he needed to score more than 450 points _and_ have the lowest score at least a seventy.

"Your time is up. Turn your exams face-down and meet me outside in ten minutes. Failure to do so will be met with disqualification," Iruka said before walking out of the classroom. Immediately after he said that, soft chatter rose between the members of class. Unlike like last year, none of them had broken into tears and ran from the class, but that didn't necessarily mean that they were any more confident that they passed the exam, and thought this grace period was enough to prod their friends for one or two answers before moving out.

Far from subtle, but entirely expected. A shinobi was expected to grasp any and all opportunities for the best mission results. This was, of course, the reason for the time limit. Not long enough to make utter failures into passes, but narrow failures into narrow passes was entirely within the realm of possibility. Naruto doubted that they realized that was the intent, it took him until his second try to figure it out. No doubt Shikamaru already had the entire test pegged and pulled an eighty because any more was just too troublesome, as he would say.

He could've sworn that the written exam was easier last year, though. Not in the last place because there was a rather subtle genjutsu on the paper that he had to covertly dispel, and he wasn't very good at covertly dispelling. Fortunately there wasn't a rule against flaring or pulsing chakra or he'd have been in trouble.

Naruto had little difficulty with the obstacle course or the taijutsu portion of the exam, though the glint in Iruka-sensei's eye as he once again aced the taijutsu portion was unsettling. As he walked back inside for the jutsu portion of the exam, he racked his brain. Iruka hadn't degenerated into hating him again, did he? He was fairly sure Iruka hadn't as the man had bought him ramen not even two days ago and he'd noticed nothing wrong then. He was sure he would notice if something was wrong, though he supposed Iruka-sensei was a chūnin for a reason.

He sat back in his earlier seat next to the girl with weird pale eyes, Hinata wasn't it?, as he silently though if he should give the Daitoppa a try regardless of his success at the jutsu. If he flunked the Bunshin as expected and aced the rest, including the Teppōdama and Daitoppa, he'd be able to scrape up enough compensation for excluding the Bunshin and pass regardless as long as he passed the rest, which he had done twice now – except for the written portion which he only passed for the first time last year – so he was confident that he could pass.

"Uzumaki Naruto!" Iruka-sensei called out far earlier than he expected. Were they going in reverse order for this?

He grinned, hiding his nervousness behind a confident façade as he followed Iruka into the room set aside for the jutsu test. The room was lined in seals that would read the chakra used for the jutsu. Among other things, it tested for the quantity of excess chakra versus the quantity of chakra needed for the jutsu. Unknown to Naruto, non-perfect scores _were _possible, but depended on the chakra control readout given by the seals. A score of 1 or lower meant a perfect mark assuming the jutsu was performed properly, though between 2 and 6 was enough to get a passing mark for that jutsu. This meant, in the grand scheme of things, that if you took the amount of chakra generating a score of 1 and gave it to someone with _perfect_ chakra control, they could perform the jutsu in question one additional time. Equally unknown to Naruto, Iruka and Mizuki had specific instructions that Naruto could score a 15 or less and still get a perfect mark. He just had _that much_ chakra. Curiously enough, neither teacher ever considered that Naruto's problem with the Bunshin may simply be that Naruto had too much chakra to control, and that a costly elemental Bunshin, like the Kaminari Bunshin, would solve their student's issues with the clone technique.

"Alright Naruto, I want you to perform the **Kawarimi on jutsu**, the **Henge no jutsu**, and the **Bunshin no Jutsu**. You are allowed to perform a single additional jutsu for extra credit," he said and Naruto's soaring hope he would eke out a pass came crashing down like a meteor. "Start with the **Kawarimi**."

He flipped morosely, but swiftly, through the handseals and commanded his chakra to allow him to switch positions with the chair. Three characters lit up behind him as he did so without any sort of smoke. Iruka and Mizuki were stunned to see that the twelve-year old with as much chakra as the Hokage more than fifty years his senior managed a score of 4, rather than last year's 11 or the 14 the year before that. The third character shed some light on the mystery, however hard it was to believe for the two teachers that he had stumbled on this version of the Kawarimi. There were, in essence, two versions of the Kawarimi. The first would simply act as a high-speed double-ended slingshot, replacing a user with the chosen object, usually a log, through simple high-speed movement. The smaller the target object was, or rather how much it weighed compared to the user, determined the amount of chakra necessary for the jutsu and thus how much control was minimally required. For this reason they used a log weighing the exact average of the weight of the class, Akimichi excluded, and a separate log for any Akimichi. The chakra required to reinforce the body to not fall apart at those speeds was what truly limited people from spamming the Kawarimi, though the cost did decrease linearly with decreasing distance. For this reason, breeding animals for the express purpose of being Kawarimi-bait was a very popular and lucrative practice among shinobi and civilians alike.

The third character that lit up indicated that that Naruto had used the second version of the Kawarimi, usually only taught as an exercise for aspiring genjutsu specialists. Often named the True Kawarimi in texts, it was a space-time version that served as the basis of the famed Hiraishin no jutsu, not to be confused with the Raiton technique of the same vocalization. One meant Flying Thunder God, the other meant Lightning Rod. The latter was simply an annoying B-rank Raiton jutsu, the former was an army-killer that earned the Yondaime the title 'Konoha no Kiroii Senkō'. The True Kawarimi used an amount of chakra approximately triple that of the Standard Kawarimi to do the replacement itself, but required no chakra reinforcement to keep the body in one piece, nor was it halted in any way by walls. The only reason it wasn't taught beyond genjutsu and fūinjutsu specialists was the understanding of chakra required to not erase yourself from existence, similar to all time-space jutsu, and most people didn't really care about the intricacies of chakra as long as it did what they wanted it to do.

Apparently, for some people that understanding came instinctually. _I wonder why he didn't do this last year, though_, Iruka mused._ He used just about the same amount of chakra_ _now as he did then._

Iruka nodded, suitably impressed by the student that had wormed his way into his heart three years ago. "Very good Naruto. Do you realize what you've just done?"

Naruto looked confused as he performed the jutsu once more, placing him back at his earlier position. "No, sensei. I don't."

"You used an advanced version of the **Kawarimi no Jutsu**, transforming it from a simple high-speed technique into a full-blown **Jikūkan Jutsu**, usually only taught to those who aspire to become genjutsu and fūinjutsu specialists because of the understanding of chakra it requires." He levelled a deadpan stare at Naruto. "You just did so instinctually."

"That's good, right?" he asked apprehensively. He didn't understand, a replacement was a replacement, right?

"That's extra credit worth, though I'll have to speak to the Hokage just how much extra credit."

Relief flooded Naruto's face. Maybe the loss of a second extra jutsu wouldn't be that bad if this second entry of extra credit could add to his fourth jutsu and compensate for his Bunshin?

"Continuing on, please perform the **Henge no Jutsu**."

Naruto flipped through the second set of handseals with renewed vigour, his hope for a passing grade renewed. He grasped his chakra and layered it over his body as he had been shown back in first year. With a puff of smoke to disguise the actual transformation, the chakra took on the shape that Naruto had in mind, his surrogate grandfather Sarutobi Hiruzen in full Hokage regalia. The Hokage replica nodded sagely in an exact imitation of the person whose face Naruto now wore. "Good day, Iruka-kun," it said in a perfect imitation of the Hokage's voice, almost absently fiddling with his ever-present pipe.

"Good day, Hoka-," Iruka started to say before he caught himself. "Very,_very_ well done, Naruto-kun. You can change back now," Iruka said, thoroughly impressed by the quality of Naruto's transformation. Sure, the sealing array gave him a score of 7, indicating that he used eight times the minimal amount of chakra required for the transformation, but that was expected from his massive reserves and still in line with the Hokage's directives for a perfect score. And, truth be told, Naruto had gotten even minute details right, like the way the Hokage liked to fold his right sleeve ever so slightly higher than the left, which made the extra chakra completely and utterly worth it. A thought struck Iruka like a lightning bolt and he almost slapped himself for not thinking of it earlier. Perhaps his student's problem with the standard clone were from the amount created?

When his student released the transformation to reveal his blonde locks to the world once more, he nodded in agreement with his own thought processes.

"Please perform the **Bunshin no Jutsu**, and don't bother trying to restrain yourself to a set number of clones," Iruka said, drawing a curious glance from Mizuki.

"What are you doing, Iruka?" Mizuki asked softly.

"The seals indicate that he uses a lot of excess chakra with his techniques," Iruka replied just as softly, unaware that Naruto was perfectly capable of hearing them and had stopped to pay attention. "The illusionary clones are sensitive to even very small amounts of extra chakra, so I figured that instead of creating three clones as standard with extremely excessive amounts of chakra each, why not use the same amount of chakra to create forty clones? Or four hundred?"

"While I don't disagree with the line of thinking, the guidelines do say that the number of clones can't exceed five, Iruka," Mizuki replied.

Iruka frowned and grabbed his own instructor's manual. "Truly?" he wondered aloud as he flipped the pages. And lo, there it was under the Jutsu – Bunshin header; _Upon creating a__ number of Bunshin exceeding five __the__ result__is__ an immediate perfect fail for the student. _He sighed.

"Looks like you're right, Mizuki," Iruka said. A brief flash of victory lit up Mizuki's eyes, but it was gone before either of the two noticed.

"Looks like you're out of luck, Naruto. No more than five Bunshin are allowed."

Naruto sighed the sigh that could only come from long suffering, and his first eight years of life definitely qualified for that. The four after that weren't nearly so bad, but the civilians still despised him and the shinobi mostly kept their distance except for that weird snake-lady and her pretty red-eyed friend, though even they never went out of their way to meet up with him. He could understand; they had better things to do with their time than look after an orphan boy.

"Right," he said despondently as he went through the three handseals required for the technique.

With a poof and an absolutely atrocious amount of smoke – enough that Iruka was glad that the room was ventilated –, Naruto created exactly five Bunshin. They were fell things, though. Their skin had a reddish hue to it, blood-red lines criss-crossing over the surface, orange hair, and brilliant purple eyes. In light of their visual dissimilarity to their creator, the fact that they were on their knees puking up their guts was a minor inconvenience. The bright kanji displaying '38' didn't even matter anymore.

Iruka thought that the clones kind of, looked like the Kyūbi if it had been given a human form.

"You fail the Bunshin, Naruto," Iruka said with sincere sorrow in his voice. "I'm sorry."

The look his student gave him nearly broke Iruka's heart. He could only offer a sad look. "I'll buy you ramen tonight, okay?"

"Sure, Iruka-sensei," Naruto said without changing expressions. _It truly is a sad day when an offer of ramen can't raise the spirits of __Uzumaki __Naruto_, Iruka thought morosely.

"Please exit through the other door Naruto. As much as I would like to chat we've got more students to test."

Without looking back, Naruto shambled out the room and made his way to out of the Academy, completely forgetting about any extra jutsu that may have seen him pass regardless.

– – – –

_It's not fair!_ The blond yelled to himself as he sat down on the carved head of the Yondaime, the top of which was probably his favourite place in the village whenever he needed to be alone.

_Why did there have to be a stupid rule about the amount of Bunshin? Aren't more Bunshin distractions better than a few anyway? _

Footsteps behind Naruto broke him out of his reverie. "Mizuki-sensei?" he asked when he had turned around.

Mizuki sat down next to him. "Hey Naruto," he greeted the child. They lapsed into silence. _You don't do anything without a reason, Mizuki-sensei. What's up? _Naruto wanted to say, but something about Mizuki-sensei unsettled him and he stayed his tongue.

"Say, did you know there a possibility for a make-up exam?" the white-haired chūnin out of the blue after a few minutes of silent companionship.

"What?" Naruto asked incredulously, turning to face the man. _A make-up exam? But __you know as well as I that__ that requires nineties across the board with the exception of a single seventy. _His eyes narrowed slightly. _What the hell is going on, Mizuki-sensei?_

"I know, I know," Mizuki said, waving a dismissive hand in the air, completely misinterpreting Naruto's question. "But don't be mad at Iruka-sensei for forgetting to mention it, okay?"

Before Naruto could indignantly say he wasn't, Mizuki continued, "So, here's what you gotta do..."

– – – –

Night had fallen over Konohagakure no Sato. The majority of the village had gone to bed to rest for the next day, a day of new challenges, meetings, customers, and the like. The other part of Konoha's populace were shinobi, the 'warriors of the dark'. The silent, the lethal, the unseen unless they want you to see them. But above all, shinobi are those that walk the twilight.

Unlike their reputation, most shinobi are actually asleep during the night. Only those involved in assassination and sabotage are often awake while others sleep, but even they enjoy a good night's rest from time to time.

Sometimes, though, even those shinobi that are usually asleep during the night lay awake, restless. Like a blond child whose least derogatory nickname is 'flashlight-head'. This child had claimed a clearing for himself and was in the process of unfurling a very important-looking scroll, eager to learn one or two jutsu from it.

Opening the scroll, the child decides to check the various jutsu recorded on the normally high-security scroll. "Huh, neatly organized into multiple sections," he said, wondering who had gone to the lengths necessary to be able to class every forbidden technique in the scroll. "First section: forbidden due to chakra cost. Kage Bunshin no jutsu, B-rank, create solid chakra-copies from the user. Warning: psychic feedback from dispersal may cause neural overload upon sustained use of the technique."

The child tilted his head in confusion. "What the hell is psychic feedback?" he asked himself, as if his subconscious knew the answer. After a minute he shook his head to get his thoughts back on track and take a look at the other ten jutsu listed as being forbidden due to chakra cost. Three jumped out from the rest.

Genjutsu: Kokuangyo no jutsu, S-rank, enshroud the target in darkness, robbing them of their sight.

Katon: Gōka Mekkyaku, S-rank, breathe a wall of fire at the opponent. Made famous by Uchiha Madara for taking out three hundred opposing Kumo shinobi at once.

Suiton: Chō Uzu Tatsumaki, S-rank, user creates a massive spiralling vortex of water at the target location. Became infamous during the Uzushio Massacre for allowing six individuals to take out nearly the entire Kiri fleet.

Whistling appreciatively at the destructive power mentioned by the latter two techniques more detailed description, Naruto decided to look through the entire scroll before returning to the rest.

"Section two: forbidden by clan. Beruserukā no jutsu, increases strength, speed, agility, and reaction speed by seven fold in return for three years of the users life and approximately half of the user's chakra. Yeesh. Banned by Senju Hashirama at the urging of the Inuzuka Clan Head after its use killed the previous Clan Head.

"If that's how all of them go, I don't even _want_ to learn them. Let's see...

"Yeah, imitation of the Hyūga Byakugan for ten minutes. Fifty percent chance for permanent blindness, one hundred percent chance of permanently burning out ocular nerves if the user has either an active or inactive dōjutsu themselves. Imitation of the Sharingan for much the same penalties. Replacement of eyes will not fix sight."

Naruto shivered. He would not like losing his eyesight, and couldn't imagine what it'd be like for someone like the Hyūga to be rendered blind. Returning his attention to the scroll to avoid thinking of such horrible things, he soon reached the last section.

It stood out to him because it only contained one jutsu. "Section seven: forbidden for disrupting the natural order. Edo Tensei, sacrifice a life to bring a deceased ninja back in his or her prime under the user's control." He shivered again, and nearly threw up at the mere thought of the jutsu. Who the hell would be insane enough to do something like that? For that matter, who would be insane – and skilled enough, he supposed after a few minutes – to _create_ a technique like that? Was there a seal to counter the effects of the seal recorded with the Edo Tensei? He hoped there was, and if there wasn't he would learn fūinjutsu and design it himself!

But first, he had to graduate. Fūinjutsu studies were _very_ restricted due to the danger of seals going wrong. You couldn't even start until you were a genin, and only with the approval of your jōnin-sensei.

"So... Kage Bunshin no Jutsu aand..." he paused to consider the merits of each technique. "...Chō Uzu Tatsumaki." Eventually choosing the second technique because it was written with the same kanji as part of his family name.

He wrote down the instructions to both the Suiton and Katon jutsu before he went back to the Kage Bunshin. It looked simple enough; the chakra moulding was the same for the Shadow Clone as it was for the standard clone, the main difference were the additional two handseals – ending in something that looked like it used to be an Ox sign – and the amount of chakra necessary.

Naruto decided not to worry about the psychic feedback for now. Reading the description thrice, and then thrice again just to make sure he wouldn't mess up, he decided to sit down and practice.

Ten minutes later, he was looking at a clearing full of clones. Giving a mental command for them to dispel, he performed the jutsu again with the intent to create as few clones as he could. He still created forty clones.

"I need to work on my control," he mused four attempts later, when he had created thirty, sixty, twenty, and eighty-seven clones. A rustling in the trees caught his attention and he quickly dispelled his Kage Bunshin, put his two copied jutsu away, and swiftly rolled up the Forbidden Scroll.

To Naruto's great consternation, Iruka-sensei landed in front of him, and he did not look very pleased. "NARUTO!" Iruka-sensei yelled at the same time that Naruto swore loudly.

– – – –

"Haha, pay up, everyone!" the aged man said to the six currently in his office before extending a hand and cackling. All of them were paying rapt attention to Hokage's crystal ball; a monitoring device devised by Senju Tobirama for the purpose of spying on the Konoha Hot Springs, adapted for other purposes by his successor.

Such as watching a blond twelve-year old.

With a grumble the four ANBU guards of the Hokage, Morino Ibiki, and Mitarashi Anko placed money in their leader's hand.

– – – –

"Damnit sensei!" Naruto yelled, much to Iruka's shock. Naruto never spoke that way to him! "Couldn't you have waited for ten _freaking_ minutes so Mizuki could arrive here first and allow me to win my bet with jiji?!"

Iruka looked baffled. "What bet, Naruto?"

"The one where you arrived here _after_ Mizuki!"

"Wait, what?" Iruka asked, still supremely off-kilter by his favourite gaki's odd behaviour. Before Naruto could explain, Iruka saw a glint of metal out of the corner of his eye and decided that explanations could wait. "NARUTO GET DOWN!" he yelled as he shoved Naruto out of the way, using his body to shield the younger from the Fūma shuriken hurtling towards them.

"I'm surprised that you found this place, Umino," a voice in the trees said. "This may complicate things," the same voice said as the body that belonged to it appeared on a tree branch. Mizuki jumped down from the tree.

"I see," Iruka said, gritting his teeth in pain. "So that's how it is."

"Hand over the scroll, Naruto," Mizuki said, ignoring the other chūnin in the clearing and extending a hand towards to the not-yet-genin.

"Like he-" "Naruto don't give him the scroll," Iruka interrupted him.

Mizuki tsk'd and decided to salvage what was left of the situation by attempting to ruin the precious child-teacher bonds. "Naruto, Iruka is afraid of you having that scroll. Truly, he is. Let me enlighten you. You see, there's a rule concerning you, put into place by the Sandaime."

Naruto tilted his head. This was genuine news to him. "What rule?"

"We're not allowed-" "STOP IT, MIZUKI!" "- to say that you are the demon fox that attacked the village twelve years ago!"

Naruto froze from shock. _That was the reason everyone hates me? __That I'm the Kyūbi? _

Mizuki, meanwhile, took the second Fūma shuriken from his back and gripped it tightly, preparing to throw it straight through the blond child frozen in depressing thoughts. Before he could complete the motion that would launch the oversized shuriken at the child, a firm hand gripped Mizuki's wrist.

Iruka and Mizuki turned to look at the new arrival, and stared right into a white porcelain mask, adorned by markings to resemble a wolf. A second, third, and fourth figure entered the clearing in short order, their only difference in attire being the markings on their masks.

"Chūnin Tōji Mizuki, you are hereby arrested for breaking Sandaime-sama's law regarding the status of the Kyūbi. Tora and Hitsuji, escort Chūnin Umino to the hospital. Neko, escort Uzumaki-san to the Hokage Office."

"Hai, Ōkami-taichou," the other three replied in unison. In a swirl of leaves, the clearing emptied of humans.

– – – –

A similar swirl of leaves heralded the arrival of Neko and her young passenger in the Hokage's office. Upon seeing Naruto's practically catatonic state, the Hokage turned to Neko and asked, "Neko, what happened?"

"Tōji-chūnin stated his belief that Uzumaki-san _was_ the Kyūbi, rather than the Kyūbi's jailor. In addition to this, Tōji-chūnin drove a Fūma shuriken into Umino-chūnin's back, though the shuriken in question was aimed at Uzumaki-san. It is a well-known fact throughout the village that Umino-chūnin and Uzumaki-san have a friendly relationship that the latter cherishes. I hypothesize that this lead to an already compromised mental state prior to Tōji-chūnin spouting his belief regarding the Kyūbi and resulted in Uzumaki-san's current state."

He nodded. "Ibiki, Anko," he said with enough chill in his voice to freeze the entire village. The two named shinobi stood up straight, though Anko looked positively gleeful. "Carte Blanche. When he's given up all his information, I want his head on a platter."

"Thank you, Hokage-sama!" Anko cheered. She gave Naruto a quick hug, making sure that his face was pressed between her sizable breasts – because any straight male would cheer up from that, right? And it wasn't as if she was going to do that to just anyone, the blond gaki was _special_ – before releasing him and vanishing in a swirl of leaves.

"Of course, Hokage-sama," Ibiki agreed. There was no obvious cheer in his voice, but it was plain to anyone that had worked with him for even a month that Mizuki's actions hadn't endeared him to the scarred Head of T&I. He, too, vanished in a swirl of leaves without waiting for his superior to dismiss him.

He made a swift hand-sign and the ANBU in the room left as well. He stood up and made his way to his grandson in all but blood. Kneeling before the child, he pulled the diminutive young man in a hug. No one should have had to be introduced to such a burden in such a way. _Damn Mizuki to Hell_, he thought angrily.

"Naruto," he called, trying to get the child's attention. Seeing that it didn't work, he tried again but louder.

It took four such tries before he finally got a response. "Hey, jiji," Naruto said in tone he couldn't readily identify. It was something of a cross between a man condemned and a man walking towards his own death.

It utterly broke his heart. "I am so sorry, my boy," was the only thing he could offer as an apology. "I had hoped you'd have something of a normal childhood, but it appears that even after the events of your eighth birthday that was not to be."

Naruto just cried silently. "However, Mizuki was not telling the entire truth."

Naruto stilled and turned to look at him. "What do you mean, jiji?" he asked.

"Mizuki may have believed, as do most of the villagers still, that you _are_ the Kyūbi, the truth is that you are but its jailor."

"Wha-?" Naruto uttered intelligently. "What do you mean, jailor?"

"Have you ever wondered why you have a seal on your stomach, Naruto?"

Naruto nodded. _Of course he had, who wouldn't? _"That seal holds the Kyūbi within you."

The pair fell silent. Naruto's sobs had subsided, but he could feel that the child's mental crisis was not over yet.

"Why me?" Naruto finally asked after a few minutes.

"The Kyūbi is a force of nature, Naruto. Forces of nature cannot be killed, or would you like to try and kill the wind?" Feeling his grandson fervently shake his head against his chest, he chuckled slightly. "The best one can do against forces of nature is to seal them away.

"However, the Kyūbi was much to powerful for most seals. Only the most powerful of seals on the most resilient of hosts would do. Fortunately, you were born mere moments before the Kyūbi started its rampage. That is to say, only an Uzumaki child could possibly hope to contain the Kyūbi. You."

"So I'm an actual Uzumaki? I mean, I wasn't just given the name in memory of a friend?" Naruto asked, halfway hopefully.

"Indeed. Your mother was Uzumaki Kushina. In common parlance, she would be called 'badass', I believe the word is. She's since disappeared to places unknown and she hasn't kept in touch."

Naruto's face fell. "I see," he said morosely. His heart went out to the boy, to learn that he had family alive but that they, his own _mother_, had not contacted him since his birth?

That had to hurt. "To get back on track, after Minato, the Yondaime, convinced Kushina to give you up for the sealing Minato summoned Shinigami-sama to seal the Kyūbi away within you. Before I could retake my place as the Sandaime, someone had leaked that you were the Jinchūriki – that's the word for hosts of demons – of the Kyūbi to the adults in the village. The best I could do was put a law in place preventing anyone from talking about it, but that has been less successful than I hoped."

"At least you tried, jiji," Naruto said after a while digesting his grandfather's words, wrapping his arms tighter around the older man. _Truly, Naruto, your forgiveness knows no bound._ _I can only hope our world will not completely change that_.

"I do have a present for you, Naruto-kun," he said after a few moments of silence.

"You do, jiji?"

"Indeed. You did successfully complete the agreed-upon mission to flush out the traitor, remember?" Without waiting for confirmation and steadfastly ignoring the bright expression adorning Naruto's face, he reached into his pocket and withdrew a Konoha-standard hitae-ate. He released the child and straightened, placing the official Hokage Hat on his head. He cleared his throat.

"Uzumaki Naruto," he began in his best official voice. "For your role in the successful identification and capture of the traitor Tōji Mizuki, you are hereby merit-promoted to the rank of Genin. You will report at noon two days from now to the Shinobi Academy for your ninja identification photograph. Your team assignment will be a fortnight from the day of the Graduation Exam."

He handed the cloth to Naruto, who reverently tied it to his head, proudly displaying the stylized leaf on his forehead. When Naruto had finished tying the knot, he hugged his grandfather so hard that he was sure his bones creaked.

It would be an hour before Naruto let go of the Hokage, and another hour after that before the child made his way to his apartment.

– – – –

Naruto was not one to give into exhaustion. His Uzumaki blood meant that he had nearly limitless stamina, and with his rather excellent speed – especially for his age – the only one that could really catch him following a prank was Iruka-sensei being a former prankster himself.

Today, however, he was truly and utterly _spent._ The graduation exam, and the rising and falling hope that he'd be able to pass, followed by the crushing feeling of failing. Then Mizuki-teme and his false 'graduation exam'. His going to the Hokage with his suspicious, essentially being told that he was correct and being ordered to play along. He got a few jutsu out of the entire ordeal so it wasn't all that bad, but the crown jewel that overshadowed all – even him officially becoming a genin – was him learning about the Kyūbi no Kitsune, the Nine-Tailed Fox, stuck in his gut.

For the first time in his life, and he sincerely hoped the last, Uzumaki Naruto was mentally and physically _exhausted._ Even so, it took two hours for his body to shut down and send him into Morpheus' embrace.

– – – –

A sewer. Naruto had had bad dreams before, but dreaming about a sewer?

That was new. It was a very strange sewer, too. The water just slid off his skin and clothes and there was absolutely zero stink in the air. He looked around and noted that the sewer was illuminated such that there were no shadows, and there were two strange pipes running across the ceiling.

Without thinking, he put one foot in front of another and started to walk. He did not know where he was walking towards, nor was he exactly in control of his body at the moment.

Minutes passed, as did twists and turns in the sewer network. Finally, after what felt like hours, he spotted a red glow in the distance. Horror movie protagonists' deaths flashed in front of his mind as his legs moved on their own according toward the red glow. He wanted nothing more than to stop and observe the red glow before entering it so that he would avoid the fate of aforementioned protagonists.

But it was not to be. His legs led him straight into and through the red glow – without harm – and _through the bars_. Almost belatedly he realized that he had _entered his seal_, the seal holding back the Kyūbi no Kitsune! The red glow cleared as soon as he passed between the bars, but he did not see the gigantic fox of legend.

Instead, his breath hitched when he saw the most beautiful woman he had seen in his short life so far. Given that this list included the likes of Yūhi Kurenai, Mitarashi Anko, and Uzuki Yūgao – though the latter was known to him only as 'Neko' – that was quite the achievement.

Waist-length red hair crowned a mostly round face, one bang falling slightly off to the side in front of her face while another was forced aside using a hairclip. Vibrant amethyst eyes beheld the world, or in this case a twelve-year old blond, while the younger's eyes drank in a body that would leave many men drooling and an even greater number of women jealous. Healthy pink skin, generous breasts, wide hips, a narrow waist, and long legs culminated in what appeared to Naruto as divinity made flesh.

The fact that two red-furred ears stuck up out of her hair or that there were nine red tails lazily swishing about behind her didn't register in his mind, for there was one very big distraction; the beautiful woman in his seal was utterly naked.

Propelled backward by the force of his massive nosebleed, Naruto passed out inside his seal.

The woman stared, amused with the situation. "Ara, perhaps forgoing clothing wasn't the brightest of ideas."

She promptly shifted her appearance to include her preferred mode of dress; pants, shirt, bandages around her upper right thigh for a – currently absent – kunai pouch, and wooden geta similar in model to Jiraiya of the Sannin. Being a kitsune had it's advantages; she never, ever needed to wash her clothes, or even _own_ clothes in the first place. She still did regardless, keeping up a transformation just wasted chakra while on a mission. "Ara, such a little pervert," she said mildly before smiling wickedly. "Such a good kit."

She walked over to the unconscious child and cradled him in her hands and carefully wrapped her tails around him. She frowned. He was far too light and small for his age.

Even considering the late growth spurt of the Uzumaki, Naruto was nearly a full 30cm shorter and 9kg below Uzumaki average for a twelve-year and some months old kit, clocking in at – to her best estimate – approximately 130cm and 30kg. He already had the looks of his father though. She didn't doubt he'd be a heartthrob when he passed puberty.

She hummed a soft tune from her childhood in Uzushio as she waited for him to awake.

After close to half an hour she felt him stirring, slightly nuzzling into the tail cradling his head. His breathing sped up, as did his heartbeat, but he did not otherwise show signs of being awake. Tilting her head in confusion, it took a while for the light bulb to illuminate her thought processes.

"Ara," she said. "I'm dressed now, Naruto-kun."

Naruto opened one eye cautiously. He hadn't seen any clothing, though granted he didn't see much beyond the vision of divinity given form, before he passed out and decided to be cautious. Lacking much in the way of social education and what was considered to be acceptable behaviour, he had once wanted to speak to Kurenai while staying the night on her and Anko's couch. He walked in on her half-naked while changing into pyjamas and promptly received a beating and lecture-rant on perversion.

He wasn't willing to take much of a chance after such an experience. Sure enough, he could see fabric covering the unknown woman's form. Deciding to trust her words, he opened both eyes fully and drank in her face. Only then did he notice the ears and the fact he was strangely comfortable in her presence. He especially liked being held the way he was now, it was always what he imagined it'd be like to be held by a mother.

He reached out tentatively, instinctually, to her ears. She lowered her head to grant him easier access and softly moaned when he scratched her in _that spot_ just behind her ears. Startled, he pulled his hand back and stared at it, almost as if he couldn't believe what the appendage just did.

Considering what he knew of her and his heritage, it was far more likely than she wanted to admit to herself.

"Who are you?" Naruto asked in a soft voice.

She grinned. "As you may have deduced, I am the Kyūbi no Kitsune."

He gently stroked a tail. "I figured that," he said dryly.

"Glad to see your powers of observation are undiminished," she said with a near-feral grin. "What you may not know, however, is my _name._"

"Your name? You mean something other than Kyūbi?" he asked curiously, tilting his head like a proper kit when they're curious.

She nodded. "Indeed. You know me as naught but the Kyūbi no Kitsune, but I am..."

She paused to let the dramatic tension build up. Tsume-nee never failed to express her exasperation whenever she did so when she was still free, so she built up a fondness for it.

"... Uzumaki Kushina, your mother."

Naruto's eyes rolled into the back of his head and his world became dark once more.

– – – –

**Translations, if they're not canon they're courtesy of : **

**Genjutsu: Illusion arts**

**- Kokuangyo: Infinite Darkness**

**Kawarimi no Jutsu: Body Replacement Technique**

**Henge no Jutsu: Transformation Technique**

**Bunshin no Jutsu: Clone Technique**

**Kaminari Bunshin: Lightning Clone (original jutsu)**

**Kage Bunshin no Jutsu: Shadow Clone Technique**

**Suiton: Water Release**

**- Teppōdama: Gunshot**

**- Chō Uzu Tatsumaki: Super Whirlpool Tornado (original jutsu)**

**Katon: Fire Release**

**- Gōka Mekkyaku: Great Fire Destroyer**

**Fūton: Wind Release**

**- Daitoppa: Great Breakthrough**

**Beruserukā no Jutsu: Berserker Technique, inspired by _The Maelstrom of Konoha Book 1 _by _Cantor_, which seems to be a dead fic though I'm hoping it's not. **

**Hai: Yes**

**Fūma Shuriken: Demon Wind Shuriken. Sometimes translated as Windmill Shuriken.**

**Tora: Bird**

**Hitsuji: Ram**

**Ōkami: Wolf**

**Neko: Cat**

**Taichō: Captain, Commanding Officer. **

**Ara: Ah, Oh. Filler sound much like 'euhm'. Jisho describes it as being pretty exclusively used by females.**

– – – –

**A/N: **

**Thanks to Chrisdz and his fic 'A foxes tale' for putting the idea in my head. The first scene has been practically stolen from the first chapter of MrDust's excellent fic 'Soul of the Seal: The Ninja Adventures' which sadly seems to be dead.**


	2. The Formation of Team 7

**Disclaimer: If you recognize it from official releases, it isn't in my possession. **

**Chapter starts off a wee bit angsty and emotional, but it clears up within a few hundred words. I don't like writing angst, having had enough of it during my pre- and early teens.**

**Update 2015-Jan-31: I accidentally sentences and accreditation. **

**Child of the Fox**

Kushina blew gently on her son's whisker marks while humming old tunes from Uzushio. She giggled lightly when he tried to lean into the gentle stream of air and met the resistance of the tails she had wrapped around him, letting out a soft whine when he was barred from moving closer to the source of the air lapping at his whisker marks.

She'd missed out on holding him for the past twelve years, she was going to take every opportunity she had to make up for lost time. It took a few minutes for her son to recover from the shock of learning the Kyūbi was his mother, and soon his eyes cracked open once more. When they had fully opened they fixated on her face, as if he was trying to burn it into his memory.

"So you were real," he said with no small amount of awe in his voice. "I thought I dreamt you."

Her heart broke upon hearing his words. She'd witnessed most of his life until now and had cried herself to sleep more than once that she couldn't be there to hold him. "I am real, musuko-kun," she said, trying to reassure her kit, her precious, precious kit that she was here, that she was going to stay, and that she was going to stay for a _long, long_ time.

"Why did you not talk to me earlier, why wait until now?" he said, his voice filled with doubt, self-loathing, and something more that she didn't _want_ to identify. The few emotions she could readily identify hit hard, so she didn't want to dig deeper into his current mental state.

"Because, musuko-kun," she replied in as strong a voice as she could muster at the moment. "Your mind is a veritable bastion. I was able to see all of it because of the seal, but communicating to you was nearly impossible because you weren't aware of me, except in very short bursts that required me to recover for a while." She could feel tears drop from her eyes. It was rather undignified for someone of her station, but right now she didn't care. "I had to sleep for a year to recover from the two messages I sent to you when you were eight."

Naruto nodded numbly, tightening his grip on his mother to almost painful levels.

Slowly, reluctantly, Kushina readied her mind for the information she was going to impart. "Right now, there are two things you must be aware of before you wake up."

Naruto looked up at his mother's face and tilted his head in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"As much as it pains me to say, you're not out of the woods yet. There are consequences to being my son," she said, and a curious mixture of dread and despair surged up in Naruto's stomach. Was he never going to be free from people trying to hurt him? "There are rather a few people, mostly Inu and Ōkami oni, who will want your head so that they can hurt me. There are also a number of humans on that list, but that's not because you're the _offspring_ of the Kyūbi, rather than because you are my container.

"Secondly, being my son means that you're a Hanyō, or half-demon. I placed a seal on you shortly after you were born to suppress your demonic blood until you were ready to learn how to control it. However, I had not counted on this seal," she spread her arms around to indicate the seal they were currently inside of, "to be added to you, and definitely did not expect the seal to be designed so that my power would slowly bleed into your own. This has caused your suppressed demonic blood to destabilize, with potentially catastrophic results. I will be removing that tomorrow."

Naruto raised his eyebrows and gulped. He did not like the sound of 'potentially catastrophic results'.

"Third, I have a home on the outskirts of the village. I was intending to raise you there, but events twelve years ago decided otherwise. It's isolated and the perfect place for you to train."

_Home?_ Naruto thought numbly, a strange feeling welling up inside him at the word. Looking back later, he would identify it as 'hope'. The hope of an orphan that he was wanted all along, that there is someone out there that cares for him, and the hope for a better – brighter – future.

"But as of this moment, you need to go catch some z's. That is, sleep," she added upon seeing her son's confused expression. "You have a long day ahead of you."

Naruto nodded, and tightened his grip on his mother's body once again. Nestled in the comforting warmth of her arms and tails, he soon found himself unable to keep his eyes open.

For the first time in his life, he fell asleep with a content smile on his face.

– – – –

Naruto awoke to the bright morning light with a yawn and a slight headache. Last night had been _crazy_. He was the son of the freaking Kyūbi no Kitsune! He wasn't entirely sure if he liked the idea of releasing the seal holding back his demonic heritage, though, despite the ominous sound of 'potentially catastrophic results'.

'_It's going to have to be done, kit,' _his mother said without so much as a 'good morning'. '_If it's not released you'll go on a rampage, killing all in sight and then going hunting for more.'_

Naruto paled. That sounded so very much _worse_ than whatever the villagers would do if he showed up with, say, fox ears. He gulped and tried to stell himself. Perhaps releasing the seal wouldn't be all that bad?

He could only hope.

'_Kaa-chan, should I speak to jiji about you?' _he inquired curiously. The man who was his grandfather in all but blood had seemed very sad when he spoke of his mother. The fact that he could help Naruto navigate the murky waters of village politics and subtly prepare the village for the day his heritage came to light was naught but a far-off consideration to his mind.

His mother's was a different matter. She had immediately latched onto the fact that, as Hokage, the Sandaime had options and resources available to him that she didn't have.

_'Might as well. Only four people knew about what I am, and it appears that two of those are now dead, and one of them is so rarely in the village it doesn't matter,'_ his mother replied with an unseen nod. '_The last is so doggedly loyal that she'd literally die before speaking of it without my permission. Having the Hokage knowledgeable would be to our benefit.'_

_'I'll go visit him later then,'_ he said. '_Now, where did you say that the house was?' _

'_At the outskirts of the village. Make your way to training ground 43, and stand near the waterfall.'_

Naruto nodded to show he had understood, but decided that he would first pay Ichiraku's a visit. Something told him that his ramen intake was about to be drastically reduced so he was going to make the most of what little time he had left to fully gorge himself on the divine food.

Inside the seal, Kushina followed his train of thought and shook her head. _Of course_ he was going to have his ramen intake reduced; she was fully intending to make him follow a _proper_ nutritional diet. It would fix his stature and weight issues in time, but for now she merely opened a link to share senses with his taste buds to taste the divine food, silently thanking Minato for creating the seal in such a way that this was possible. Ramen was the favourite food of kitsune both male and female for a very simple reason; it worked similar to a mild aphrodisiac and euphoriac. Enough to get horny and happy, not enough to jump any random attractive individual and become overly exuberant.

There was a reason the phrase 'Ramen is Inari-sama's gift to all of Creation' got started, and that reason was disguised kitsune not watching their tongues.

Naruto sped through the streets to the business sector, where Ichiraku Ramen was located.

Screeching to a halt in front of the stand, Naruto froze. _This can't be, can it?_ He asked himself, desperately wishing that this was an illusion. He put his hands in a Ram seal and swiftly pulsed his chakra in the way that Iruka-sensei said would disrupt genjutsu. A wave of chakra, similar in size and scope to the pulse he sent in his desperation four years earlier washed over the stand – and half the village – but nothing changed. That meant it _had_ to be real. But, why? Why would the Gods Above pull such a horrible trick on him? Was it Karma, finally catching up with the backlog from all his pranking? Was this Inari-sama's idea of a prank?

With a grumbling stomach, he fell to his knees. "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" he yelled out to the heavens, arms raised as if pleading for the gods to change this catastrophe. "WHY?!" he cried out as his eyes once again locked onto the sign taped to the very familiar curtain of the Ichiraku Ramen stand.

'_Ichiraku Ramen is closed due to illness.'_

His heart broken from the absence of the Heavenly Noodles, he slowly stood up and shambled towards training ground 43.

– – – –

'_So here I am, __o__kaa-__ch__an. Training ground 43.' _Naruto looked at the twenty-metre high waterfall five metres away, a feature he was sure wasn't natural for this part of Hi no Kuni, and wondered what relation it had to the mentioned house.

'_Indeed you are, __musuko-kun,'_ his mother replied. '_Now, the house is behind the waterfall. You don't yet know how to water walk, but the bottom is free of rocks so you can swim.'_

Naruto nodded and started stripping. '_Random question, kaa-chan, why are the stories all about _female_ kitsune? __Why never the males?__' _

_'Random indeed,' _his mother said with an unseen head-tilt. '_The reason for that is actually very simple; male kitsune are _rare_. For every six female kitsune born, there is _one_ male on average, though it's not __entirely __uncommon to have a litter with twelve females and no males. As a result, male kitsune are usually hoarded within kitsune territory, and __them __having a half-dozen to a dozen mates is the norm. __Partly b__ecause of this, several human social taboos do not apply, particularly __those __relating to incest. My father, for example, is also my uncle, and _his_ father is also his grandfather _and_ great-grandfather.' _

_'Truly?' _Naruto asked as he removed the last of his clothing. Perhaps that was the reason why the concept of incest didn't bother him as much as it did his classmates when Iruka-sensei talked about it during their lessons on genetics?

'_Truly,' _his mother confirmed. '_It helps that we kitsune, __like all demons,__ do not suffer from genetic degradation as a result of parent-child unions, which is the reason the incest taboo got started __among humans__ in the first place.' _

Naruto dove into the water – swimming was a necessarily skill for him before the events of his eighth – and struggled to make his way past the waterfall, trying to distract himself from the images that had popped up from the short conversation. Why did his mother have to be so gorgeous? He wasn't a particularly good swimmer, nor was his upper body strength very good – outrunning ANNBU required only leg power after all was said and done – so it took him a while, but he eventually reached the rocky dock-like structure behind the waterfall with a successful side-objective; he hadn't thought about his mother's supremely beautiful naked body the entire tri-p.

Inari-sama damn it.

He clambered up to the sort-of dry rockface, and his eyes widened as he took in the sight before him with a gasp that _wasn't _related to his earlier activity. A truly humongous garden was laid out before him, with plants so exotic he was sure Ino would have entered and not come out for _decades,_ unless forced. Despite being a cave, it was well-illuminated with what appeared to be natural light.

'_Some of my finest work; light-transmission seals. They're two linked seals and if you shine a light on one it appears out the other end, but not the other way around. I wanted to perfect them so that one collector seal could be used to transmit light to more than one emitter seal, but I didn't have the time to do so before I was sealed inside you.'_

_'I _will _want that story sometime, kaa-chan,' _Naruto said as he walked along the designated path and drank in the ambience of the garden.

_'And you will get it, Naruto-kun,' _she replied firmly. _'But not today, we have a lot to do.' _

Naruto's reply was stuck in his throat as he saw a house among the flowers, approximately fifty metres from his position. It was built in the traditional Japanese style common to the Elemental Nations, all wood and traditional shogi doors.

'_Welcome home, my son,' _Kushina said fondly.

A strange warmth spread throughout Naruto's body. His apartment had never felt like a home, just a place he'd lived. Yet, he had not even set foot in this place and he already felt relaxed, completely and utterly at ease with the world and himself, a feeling entirely foreign to him.

A small smile, full of hope for the future spread across his face. Kushina allowed her son the moment to himself, for once it was over they would truly begin.

– – – – _Two Weeks Later _– – – –

Umino Iruka whistled a jaunty tune as he walked into the classroom where the recent graduates had assembled carrying naught but a single file. Or rather, a single sheet of paper. Team assignments only required the team number, genin names, and their jōnin instructor, all of which usually fit on a single line. They'd need dozens of teams to even _start_ to require a second sheet. However, it was not the lack of files that had Iruka in such a good mood today, though less paperwork usually made _any _administrator happy.

Today was the last day he'd have to be stuck with the Twin Banshees, Yamanaka Ino and Haruno Sakura. Ino on her own was acceptable, and showed a maturity not often found in children so young, though he suspected that her clan, which specialised in the mind and the manipulation thereof, helped with that.

Put her together with Haruno Sakura and he wasn't sure his eardrums would survive any given day at the Academy, however. He personally suspected it was only partly from actual affection towards Sasuke-san, and part ingratiating her with the civilian side of the gossip fence. As most ninja, but especially the Yamanaka, knew, gossip was _powerful_. Out-of-town merchants took gossip with them to other villages – and vice versa, of course –, which sometimes paid a premium for rumours. Civilians on holiday spread gossip around the Nations, and many decisions were made from the gossip, after intelligence analysts boiled the rumours down to what was likely the core truth. For this reason, the gossip networks – and their queens – were highly important to any Hidden Village and were closely monitored. It could of course be from genuine fangirlism, but he didn't think the Yamanaka Patriach, Inoichi, would allow his daughter to be a True Fangirl for very long.

Haruno Sakura, on the other hand, was completely and unequivocally a True Fangirl, as was most of the Uchiha Sasuke Fanclub. Loud, shrill, and utterly devoted to gaining 'their sasuke-kun's' affection. His heart went out to the kid, it truly did. No one deserved a gaggle of Fangirls. He'd had half a mind to ask Mitarashi Anko – who had a near-perfect track record of breaking the 'fan' out of 'fangirl' – but decided that all he'd do was recommend her services to whatever jōnin-sensei ended up with Sakura-san on their squad. It wasn't worth the paperwork introducing Anko to the class would inevitably cause, and the other civilian girls were unlikely to be accepted into the elite program under a jōnin-sensei.

Placing the single sheet of paper of the desk, he surreptitiously put his hands in his favourite handseal, a modified Reverse Ram. The **Akuma Kokubi no Jutsu** was created for the sole purpose of shutting up children that wouldn't ordinarily do so. When they saw its effects, the other teachers of the Academy begged for him to teach them the jutsu, and he complied with little argument. Someone had apparently leaked the jutsu out of Konoha, because he got a thank-you card from an Iwa Academy teacher two years ago, expressing their undying gratitude for his invention of the jutsu.

After it had been thoroughly checked for traps, of course. It _was _Iwa, after all.

"SHUT UP!" he roared, head enlarged to six or seven times its usual size with complementary red skin and vicious horns. Within a single second, the class was silent and he dismissed the jutsu.

"Congratulations," he said simply when he was sure no one would start talking. "All of you gathered here have proven yourself worthy of joining the shinobi force of Konohagakure no Sato."

Before he could continue, the door creaked open. The light of the hallway illuminated the figure of a child that Iruka had not personally seen since he visited his bed a week ago. His shoulder-length red and blond hair was still shoulder-length – though far spikier than it had been seven days previous –, his eyes were still that brilliant amethyst-ish shade of blue, and he had abandoned his orange tracksuit for a pants-shirt-geta ensemble featuring primarily red, black, and white.

A long sheath was held diagonally across his back, appearing approximately four and a half shaku in length. The only thing that stood out about the katana was the rather unique cross-guard; a bronze four-point star that went well with the light blue hilt and dark blue sheath.

The entire look was completed by the three whisker marks adorning each cheek and the Konoha hitae-ate worn like a choker.

A sheepish expression appeared on the child's face after his eyes saw that the unofficial ceremony was already underway. "Sorry I'm late," he said.

"It's fine, Naruto," he assured him. "I've literally just congratulated everyone on making it this far before you came in. Take a seat," he finished with a hand extended into the classroom.

"Wait," a voice spoke up, and most faces turned towards the speaker, one Haruno Sakura. "Didn't Naruto fail the exam?"

"His failing was staged so that we could make use of his pariah status to catch a traitor," Iruka explained patiently, causing eyes everywhere to widen in shock. "During the apprehension of said traitor, Naruto behaved like we expect Konoha shinobi to do and he gained a merit promotion to genin," Iruka explained. "In addition to this, had it not been for the Bunshin Naruto would've passed in the top five with a score of 490, only beaten by you, Uchiha Sasuke, Hyūga Hinata, and Ami, in that order."

Almost the entire class turned astonished gazes towards Naruto, not expecting the one they often called 'dobe' to perform that well. Iruka fought back a smirk even as Hinata smiled demurely at her not-so-secret crush even as she fought her own amazement at ending in the top five of the class rankings, and almost fainted when the new-and-improved Naruto sat down next to her.

"With that bit of excitement over, let's continue," Iruka said with a clap of his hands to gather the attention of the class.

"You have graduated from the Academy. Four years of learning are past you, but your ninja path is only just starting, and it'll only get more difficult from here. You have earned the rank of genin, but this is only the first step, and the easiest one.

"I am proud of all of you, and wish you the best of luck on your continued journey through the marshes of what we call life. If there is only one thing you remember from your time at the Academy, let it be this:

"You are now Konoha shinobi, the pride of the Hidden Leaf, the oldest and strongest of the Great Five. You are now representatives of the village, and you are allowed to take pride in that fact, as long as that pride doesn't go to your head."

Iruka's gaze swept across the enraptured faces of the genin in front of him, and wished that he could speak as well as this during the more traditionally boring courses, like history.

"Now then, as is tradition you have been divided into teams of three.

"Team 1, under jōnin Shiranui Genma, consisting of...

"Team 7, under jōnin Hatake Kakashi, consisting of Haruno Sakura, Uchiha Sasuke..." at this point Iruka made to protect his ears from Sakura's squeal. He wasn't fast enough.

"TRUE LOVE PREVAILS!" she shouted, deafening everyone in the classroom. Naruto and Kiba in particular, being in possession of heightened senses, were _not _appreciative of their classmate's volume and pitch, and both pitied the as-yet unannounced third member of team seven.

"... and Uzumaki Naruto," Iruka finished. Naruto turned a betrayed gaze toward the scarred teacher. Iruka responded with a shrug and an apologetic expression. "I don't make the teams, Naruto."

Naruto grumbled even as Kiba reached forward from the row behind him to pat him on the back. They may not always get along, but being on the same team as the Banshee Queen was not something either wished on their worst enemy. He made eye contact with the dog-nin, trademark dog resting on his head, and nodded in thanks before turning back to face Iruka.

"Team 8, under jōnin Yūhi Kurenai, consisting of Aburame Shino, Hyūga Hinata, and Inuzuka Kiba.

Team 9 is still in circulation from last year, so team 10, under jōnin Sarutobi Asuma will consist of Akimichi Chōji, Nara Shikamaru, and Yamanaka Ino.

"Your sensei will be here after noon to pick you up, for now we will have a one hour recess, after which you will return here and be picked up by your sensei. Dismissed."

The majority of the class began to chat excitedly as they rose from their seats.

– – – –

The next four hours were spent in a variety of ways by the prospective teams. Teams 2, 8, and 10 decided to go for lunch to properly get to know each other as teams – though the latter were already familiar with one another, they weren't a _team_ up to that point –, while teams 1, 3, 4, and 6 were already friendly with one another and went their separate ways for now.

Team 5 had a three-way mutual dislike relationship and spent the first hour sulking before meeting up with their sensei, who then proceeded to swiftly fail the team within half an hour. They didn't even make it through the introduction without fighting amongst themselves.

As for team seven... Sakrua spent a full hour trying to woo Sasuke, who proceeded to attempt to ignore her very existence, though if one looked closely they could see that his hand twitched in the general direction of his kunai pouch every once in a while.

The third member of team seven, on the other hand, was sitting in a lotus position, quietly reflecting on the happenings of the previous two weeks.

– – – – _Two Weeks Ago – – – –_

'_Alright, first things first,' _his mother said resolutely. '_I'll need a fair bit of your blood for this, about a half to three-quarter pint will do. I'll heal the cut when the required amount of blood is in the air. After that, I'll be giving you the images of a few handseals you have to perform.'_

Naruto nodded hesitantly. Iruka-sensei had impressed upon them all the importance of blood; it could uniquely identify someone, it could be used to discern the secrets of your body if the examiner was skilled enough – very, _very_, few were but there were people out there that could –, and it could be used in sealing to bind a seal to your chakra signature. Summoning seals worked like that, but binding or caging seals infused with the blood of the bound or caged were almost impossible to break out of.

Spilling blood, let alone voluntarily spilling three-quarters of a pint of blood, was _dangerous_ to a ninja. Nevertheless, he found himself a knife in the kitchen and proceeded to bleed all over the floor. While that was going on, images of handseals appeared in his mind's eye and he followed the sequence exactly.

Suddenly a surge of power shot through him, and his hands _blurred_ to form the shown handseals at a speed he didn't think his hands were capable of.

Once his hands had stopped blurring, his mouth moved of its own accord. "**Onipō: Chishio Bunshin,**" he intoned in a voice that was far deeper than normal. The spilled blood bubbled and rose into the air, using the chakra inherent in the blood and the chakra that he had just channelled through the handseals to multiply and take on a vaguely human shape.

Over the course of five minutes, the shape taken by the blood gained definition and started to coalesce into vein-like structures. When it had gained all the definition it could and nearly gave Naruto a nosebleed because it was very obviously a female form with tails that reminded him so very much of his mother's, there was a bright flash that forced him to close his eyes.

When the spots in his vision had cleared, he gingerly opened his still hurting eyes.

The next thing he knew was his head smashing into the wall from the force of his nosebleed. His mother, once again, stood naked before him.

"Ara," Kushina said with a tilted head. "Such a good perverted little kit. Your sister is going to be overjoyed.

"Still," she added after a moment's pause. "He needs to get seduction resistance. Can't have a pretty female enemy shinobi flash him, knock him out, and then slit his throat, now can we?"

She knew that there would be, it was the number one reason why kunoichi dressed rather provocatively out in the field. There was a far greater chance to meet male nin on the opposing side than there was to meet a female nin, and a male nin that thought with his second head was one swiftly reduced to _only_ _one_ head. And not the one whose loss meant you could still live if you had medical attention swift enough. She sighed and steeled herself.

"I apologize, musuko-kun, but this is going to hurt," she said to the unconscious body of her son as she gathered chakra onto her fingertips.

She rammed her chakra coated fingertips into her son's stomach. "**Akuma Heitei: Kai**."

Red electricity raced across her son's skin as the seal suppressing his demonic blood evaporated into nothingness. She initially wanted to remove this seal from the mental representation of Naruto's stomach last night, but she pushed it back to now because she was fairly certain there was only a fifty-fifty chance of the seal being removed from the physical Naruto's stomach as well, and she wasn't sure if she could live through watching this twice. Perhaps if she had been older, but as it was she was only slightly more than a century old and seeing her son convulse while unconscious from what must have been excruciating agony _hurt_.

Her trials were not without reward, though. Naruto's human ears were replaced with two vibrant red furry ones sticking up from his mop of blond hair and seven equally red tails with white tips sprouted from his tail bone.

"Ara," Kushina exclaimed in shock. "Twelve years old and seven tails already?" She whistled appreciatively. "And I didn't even feel the loss of a quarter of my power. Minato-kun did such good work with this seal, however lamentable its necessity."

She watched as her son's short, spiky blond hair grew to his shoulders in much the same manner as his late father's. When it had stopped growing, however, she saw that approximately half of his hair changed colour from blond to red. It was a rather mesmerizing display, if Kushina was honest with herself. A quick inspection told her that the red and blond hairs alternated each other, rather than the left half of his hair remaining blond as she initially suspected it would. She grinned a very feral grin. His first heat was going to be spectacular.

After the transformation was finished and the red electricity had subsided, Naruto stilled once more.

It took another hour for him to wake, time she filled with planning a training regime for her son.

For now, she decided that going fully clothed was most beneficial to her son's education. She could work on seduction resistance later. With a thought and a mild application of chakra she was dressed in her usual attire; tight pants, shirt, metal-plated wooden geta of the same model Jiraiya wore though hers were painted white with a red Uzumaki spiral on it, and her hitae-ate around her right upper arm. The principle was similar to the mythical Banbutsu Sōzō, but unlike the mythical jutsu the kitsune transformation could only ever affect the self and those in direct contact with the kitsune in question. Once the object in question left direct contact with the kitsune who had created the object, it disintegrated rapidly. Unfortunately, this included throwing weapons.

Beyond that, however, there was no limit except what chakra reserves or Yōki pool, and the user's imagination, imposed. It appeared she was just in time too, for her Naruto-kun was already waking up once more.

Naruto sat up gingerly, softly rubbing the spot that had impacted the wall in an effort to reduce the pain. With a groan he cracked open his eyes, and gazed upon the still-lovely but less nosebleed-inducing visage that was his mother in clothes. "You're out of the seal?" he asked, barely keeping himself from stuttering. He didn't know much about the seal on his stomach, but her sudden release from it could _not _be good for him, right?

"Not exactly, Naruto-kun," she replied. "This is a jutsu that I call the Blood Clone, for obvious reasons. It's similar in principle to the Shadow Clone merged with an Earth clone, but it uses blood instead of earth. It allows me to send my consciousness out of the seal and into the clone, rendering the original me inside your seal comatose for as long as I am in this clone. The advantage of this clone is that it is almost as sturdy as the human body and can bleed, making it rather lifelike. It allows me to manifest outside the seal at approximately one-tenth to one-fourth of my power.

"Because it is similar to a Shadow Clone, whatever I experience while in the clone body will flow back to the original me when the clone dispels."

A light bulb turned on in his head at the statement. "Is that what that psychic feedback thingy I read on the scroll yesterday is?" he asked.

"Indeed it is," she confirmed with a nod.

"Does that mean I can use hundreds of Kage Bunshin and learn all about everything in moments?"

"No," she curtly said, not wanting her son to entertain dangerous thoughts like that for more than a few moments. "While the clones do transfer memory and experience, and can therefore be used to train the mind, there are diminishing returns. Too many separate subjects at once and the memories will just slip away and you will gain knowledge of nothing instead of everything. I've personally found that the limit is three completely separate subjects at once, or seven related subjects. Any more than that and the mind will not retain any of the knowledge you've gained."

"Aww," Naruto whined with a pout. There went his dreams of becoming crazy knowledgeable overnight.

"The only exceptions are chakra control and muscle memory, which can be trained with clones and fully passed on regardless of what other clones are doing, though even then I don't recommend doing more than one exercise simultaneously. Create a few Kage Bunshin, Naruto-kun," she ordered.

Putting his hands in the modified Ox seal, he yelled the name of the jutsu and five hundred clones appeared. Kushina looked around with and exasperated expression. "Right, definitely need to work on control," she muttered. "I want one hundred of you to start calligraphy exercises in the room down the hallway. One of my own Kage Bunshin will guide you," she said and created two Kage Bunshin, one of which motioned for the designated hundred to follow. When the veritable army of clones had disappeared into the room she and Minato had set aside for fūinjutsu when they built this house she continued, "the other four hundred will follow my second clone to the river and practice water-walking."

"OSSU, KAA-CHAN!" the four hundred copies of her son yelled with picture-perfect salutes.

"Add volume control," she half-muttered.

When these had marched out after her Kage Bunshin she turned to the original. "Alright, Naruto-kun," she said. "We are going to work on your senses."

"Why?" he asked with the most adorable confused expression on his face. "My senses are fine."

"By human standards, yes. By kitsune standards – and indeed that of most demons – you're practically deaf, blind, and your nerves are burned through," she said. "You've not yet noticed because there's a second seal that locked away those that I've not yet taken care of. Prepare yourself," she finished seriously.

Naruto gulped but hardened his expression. Kushina nodded in approval as the fingertips on her right hand lit up with chakra once again. "**Rokkan Fūin: Kai**," she said as she slammed the fingers home in his stomach.

The moment her hand hit his stomach, Naruto's world became _alive_, for want of a better word. He could smell things he had never smelled before, he could hear things he had never heard before, _are those individual molecules zooming through space that I hear?_, and he could feel things he had never felt before; his skin felt super-sensitive and there was a variety of feelings emanating from the village, from something that resembled the fleeting wind to the elusive water to the hard earth, the raging fire, and the crackling lightning and combinations of them all and then there was the blazing inferno coming from the woman just in front of him and –

He blacked out from information overload. His mind simply wasn't ready to accommodate that much sensory input yet.

– – – – _Two days later – – – –_

Once his brain had rebooted from the blackout, it had taken him two full days to control his new senses to the point that he wouldn't immediately be rendered deaf once he left for the village proper, though it did mean that his meeting with jiji was postponed for a few days. He was simply glad that his clones still had the seal on them when he made them or he'd be in a hell of a lot of trouble.

It made him appreciate the danger of neural overload on a completely new level. On another note, clones apparently didn't dispel upon the creator being knocked unconscious, which meant that their chakra networks were completely separate from the caster. He'd have to investigate how the memory transfer worked later.

He created another wave of two hundred clones to augment the handful of the original clones still active. "One hundred of you work on water walking, sixty of you work on senses, ten each, and the rest work on calligraphy," he ordered. Mom had said that she'd teach him the sealing arts if his calligraphy was perfect and because it was technically a clan technique he did not even need permission from his jōnin-sensei!

While the clones rushed off to their assigned duties, the original walked into the garden, intent on finding his mother. He did not have to search long, as soon as he exited the house his mother – still exuding that aura of a blazing inferno – walked out from between the plants she had been tending to. Twelve years without maintenance had left the garden a mess.

"Good morning, kaa-chan," he greeted her brightly. It was still rather hard to believe, truth be told; _he had a mother!_

"Ohayo, musuko-kun," she returned in the same tone. "Let me put the tools away before we start today, okay?"

"Sure," he said. "Outside or inside?"

"Outside," she answered as she walked into the house – was that just his imagination or did she shake her delectable posterior just that bit more? – and placed her gardening tools in the hallway closet. Within moments, she had joined him outside on the porch.

"All right Naruto-kun, stand back a bit, 'kay?" she asked and he dutifully stepped back a few paces.

Kushina bit her thumb and raced through five handseals before slamming her bloodied hand on the floor, spreading a large sealing array across its surface. "**Kuchiyose: Amatsukajiya: Ōetsu!**"

A large cloud of smoke erupted from the sealing array that had appeared on the floor. Naruto watched with wide eyes as the smoke cleared to reveal the strangest-looking man he had ever seen in his short life. His skin was dark, a trait only appearing in Konoha if direct Kumo parentage was involved, he had thick black hair styled in such a way that it looked to grow diagonally from his head, the oddest sunglasses he'd ever seen, shiny blue lenses with a bright yellow frame, and a stylish white suit that somehow complemented it all.

When only thin whisps of the smoke remained, the newcomer looked around in confusion and his brows furrowed in confusion once he saw Naruto, complete with tails and ears. A spark of recognition lit up in his eyes when he spotted his mother.

"Kushina-chan?" the man asked.

"Indeed, Etsu-kun," she confirmed. "How have you been, old friend?"

"Man, am I glad to see you," he exclaimed with a relieved sigh as he stepped forward to engulf his mother in a hug. Naruto barely held back a growl, before he adopted a confused expression. Why did he want to growl?

"You may want to release me now, Etsu-kun," his mother said teasingly. "Musuko-kun looks like he wants to rip you apart."

"Does he now?" the man, apparently called Etsu, asked, but didn't let go of her. "And can he?"

"He's twelve and has seven tails. I'm pretty sure you'd win on combat experience _only,_" she replied. The eyes belonging to the blond widened once again. What did his mother mean, 'he has seven tails'? Part of him wanted to look back to find out if he had actual tails, but the other part that wanted to keep the blacksmith in sight won.

"I noticed that," Etsu said dryly, releasing the hug. He may have wanted to keep hugging his old friend, but nanabi kitsune were no laughing matter, no matter the inexperience of their wielder. Even if he had been a dedicated fighter, which he was not, seven-tailed kitsune were _nasty _opponents. These days, he did not need to fight to survive any more. He was far too good a blacksmith for anyone to want to kill him.

"Allow me to introduce you, then," Kushina said. "Naruto, this is my old friend Ōetsu, the best blacksmith in all the realms."

"You flatter me, Kushina-chan," the blacksmith in question responded with a minor blush.

"Etsu-kun, this is my son, Naruto."

"Pleased to meet you," Ōetsu said pleasantly.

"Charmed," Naruto replied curtly. A grin appeared on the visage of Ōetsu and he muttered, "as expected of a male kitsune according to the stories," softly enough that Naruto was sure he was not on the list of intended recipients. Ōetsu turned toward Kushina, a serious expression on his face.

"I take it the time is now, Kushina-chan?" Ōetsu asked.

"Indeed it is," she confirmed with a short nod.

"Alrighty then, Naruto come here. I've got a present for you," the blacksmith said with a grin. Kushina scowled.

"Don't act like this is anything other than a commission from me, Etsu-_kun_," she said, stressing the honorific to get across her desired message. Their families were friendly, which in demonic terms meant that they weren't actively trying to kill each other. From the nervous expression appearing on the blacksmith's face for a brief moment before it flattened back into the serious if somewhat cheerful visage, the message was received in the spirit it was given.

"Right. Doesn't change that Naruto has to come here, though," Ōetsu said. Naruto cautiously walked forward until he was only two metres from the other male. The blacksmith responded by grabbing a scroll from a sleeve and opening it with a minor application of blood, courtesy of a bitten thumb.

With a poof, a katana as large as Naruto appeared in the blacksmith's hands. The sheath was a dark blue, the hilt a lighter shade of the same colour, but it was the guard that caught Naruto's attention. He'd seen katana before, but none with a guard in the shape of a bronze four-point star.

"Alright, listen up, these are the most important words you'll ever hear in your life, got it?" The serious tone in which the blacksmith said those words, so at odds with his earlier laid-back one, drew the notice of the fledgling seven-tailed kitsune.

The twin amethyst-ish blue eyes swiftly swivelled to the blacksmith's face, the mind powering them giving its complete attention to the man's words. With an approving nod, Ōetsu continued.

"This sword is my masterpiece. Nothing I've created before matches it, nothing I will ever create will surpass it, and only a small handful of blades even come close in the history of the Outer, Northern, Western, Eastern, and Southern Lands, only four of which currently have wielders. You may be familiar with the Northern shark-skin sword, Samehada?"

Seeing Naruto's eyes remain blank because he did not know what Samehada was, Ōetsu soldiered on.

"Unlike all the other swords, this blade has achieved true sapience, and gained even a spirit; though her name is for you to work out. Even Samehada and its nine sister blade only ever achieved sentience. Kyūbi fang, generously donated by your mother, Dragon scale, and Chimera horn combine to form this blade, the blade that will hold back your developing demonic power from destroying everything around you as it did for your mother nearly a century ago when she first came into her power, though Inari-sama was around then to keep it from getting out of hand."

Naruto swallowed. Before he could comment, the older male went on, "Such is the curse of all Hanyō born to Daiyōkai such as your mother. This sword was tailor-made to your power, and it should perform more than adequately in keeping your demonic nature from killing all you hold dear.

"The sword has three stages, each with abilities of their own. The only thing I am at liberty to say about them is a single word; ice."

"Ice?"

"Ice. Everything else will be explained by the spirit residing in your sword, once it's completed anyway."

Both red-heads raised an eyebrow. The sword had been slightly more than twelve and a half years in the making and it wasn't complete yet?

"Relax," the man said with a wave of his hand, "all you need to do to complete it is expose it to your blood and chakra, binding the blade and spirit residing within to you, and only you. Not even your children will be able to wield this blade once it has bonded."

Ōetsu unsheathed the sword, revealing a blade covered in hundreds of seals. He held out the sword for Naruto to take, who did so with extreme care.

The partial blond sat down in a meditative state, channelled chakra through his left hand and ran the hand through with the 140 cm long blade.

The world seemed to freeze over before it shattered into hundreds of tiny fragments, revealing a frozen landscape of such beauty he did not have words capable of describing it. In the distance he could see the outlines of literal mountains of ice, while the whitish-blue plains in between himself and the far-off mountains were filled with moving animals a shade lighter in colour and towering obelisks that appeared to be made from a single chunk of ice each. There appeared to be butterflies flying around in the sky, but when one landed on an outstretched finger it was revealed that the butterfly was actually made completely from ice. He suspected that the other animals were made from ice as well.

A loud roar sounded from overhead, and Naruto turned his gaze skyward. "Woooaaaah," he said with reverence in his voice at the sight that greeted him.

A white dragon, _dragon, _was flying above him in an intricate pattern before rapidly descending and landing with an earth-shattering thump – or was the proper term here ice-shattering? – a dozen metres from him.

Naruto stood up to walk towards it, but stopped when the dragon started to emit a white glow. Not bright enough to hurt, but he closed his eyes regardless. When he felt the light show had stopped, he re-opened his eyes and blushed fiercely. What was with him and beautiful women lately?

The woman in question was a voluptuous woman; generous breasts – though he absently noted that his mother's were still bigger, but not by a lot –, long hair that looked to be a shade or two darker than Sakura-chan's, brilliant emerald eyes, and 'dem legs', to use one of Kiba's phrases. It seemed appropriate enough in the situation.

The woman's clothing befitted the environment, her winter's dress a soft shade of blue that blended with the ice surrounding the pair. The entire picture was completed by a pair of icy wings jutting from the woman's shoulder blades.

"Woah," he repeated. A light blush appeared on the woman's face.

"Thank you, Naruto-kun. I must admit, you look decidedly more delicious than last week," she said.

"Are you the sword's spirit?" he asked. It looked very much like she was, but it never hurt to have confirmation, right?

"I am," she said with a nod. "Though that is not all of me. Because you were already born when the sword was commissioned, and at the urging of Omoikane-sama and Tenjin-sama, when Shinigami-sama was summoned into this realm, the Northern Lands, he bestowed a gift upon you that was tied to your very soul; me.

"The Kyūbi fang donated by your mother for use in the sword worked as a beacon for my energy, my body, to stay while my consciousness made its home in your soul."

She sat down in seiza in front of him. "I am ."

Naruto frowned. He had seen her lips move, but no sound came forth from her mouth after she said 'I am'. He wasn't a very good lip reader, but he suspected that her name started with 'Hyō', which would fit with the entire theme of the place.

"I'm sorry, could you repeat that?" he asked.

She frowned before shrugging. "It seems that you are not yet ready to wield the true me. No matter, you will in time.

"Now, before you go, there are two things I must say; the first is that this is your soulscape, not your mindscape. Despite their functional similarity, they are not the same; your mother cannot visit here. I can, however, enter your mindscape with impunity, even though I can't leave it like your mother can. I am tied far too closely to you to ever leave.

"The second is that I am your companion just as you are mine, our souls are intertwined until the end of time. And quite frankly, I think that the pair of us will be the most disgustingly overpowered pair in the history of the realms," she finished her monologue.

He grinned, he quite liked the sound of that. Disgustingly overpowered meant that he would be able to protect those he held and would hold dear, for he didn't doubt that the list would expand with time.

"For now, though, you have to return to the overworld, I'm sure your mother is quite anxious to speak to you," she said.

She kissed him lightly on the lips. "Until next time, Naruto-kun," she said as she underwent the mesmerizing transformation back into the beautiful white dragon.

The frozen landscape seemed to melt away, revealing his prone body being fuzzed over by his mother with the weird blacksmith guy watching in the back.

His mother didn't let him go for another half hour, despite numerous attempts from him to convince her he was all right.

– – – – _Three Days Later__ – – – –_

Naruto walked into the living room after his mother had called him here. Things had calmed down over the previous day, after the most pressing issues had been brought down manageable levels through dedicated meditation and generous amounts of Kage Bunshin. That is to say, his brain wasn't overloading at the drop of a hat from sensory input and unless someone deliberately pissed him off he wouldn't fly into a killing rampage.

"Alright Naruto-kun, it's time for you to get the story you wanted," his mother said with the most forcibly neutral expression he'd seen her wear yet. Not that that said a lot, he had only met her face-to-face three days ago after all.

Naruto swiftly sat himself down and focused the entirety of his attention on his mother.

"This story starts almost exactly one hundred and ten years before today with my birth. I was born Uzumaki Kushina, the older sister of Mito, who went on to marry Senju Hashirama. I was normal in every way by Uzumaki standards, except one; I had a disease that would not allow me to live past my sixth birthday because we didn't have the medical knowledge to treat it. My parents didn't particularly like that," she said with a sad smile. It was similar to the one jiji wore when he remembered old friends, in his opinion.

"They prayed to Inari-sama for aid, and they got it when I was five. Inari-sama's oldest daughter, Akane, was dying, so Inari-sama bonded the two of us together since practically all human diseases are burned away with Yōki exposure; it's why you're so poison resistant. You have the standard Daiyōkai Hanyō package of Yōki and human Chakra, which will paint a large target on your back. People _don't like_ Daiyōkai Hanyō in general. Too much potential for overwhelming power."

"Human chakra?" Naruto interjected.

"Yes. Human chakra is made from Yin and Yang. Mental and Phyiscal. Form without energy and energy without form. Demon chakra is made from Yōki and Reiryoku, physical and mental. Yin and Reiryoku are two names for the exact same energy, by the way. Yōki is more powerful, but is rigid. It will allow change into one element, and will stay that way. Mixing with Reiryoku makes it more flexible, but it is not easy so extremely few demons ever do so. Yang is extremely flexible, and mixing with Yin rigidifies it so that if it is transformed to an element it won't immediately fall apart into raw energy. Pure reiryoku manipulation is _rare _to the point that only three demonic clans do so, one of which is the kitsune.

"We're getting off track," she said. "After the infusion, I was taken from my parents to be trained. The deal Inari-sama struck with my parents was that I would take over the guard of Fire Country, the Northern Home of the Kitsune as the new Kyūbi, filling the void his dying daughter was about to leave. I was allowed to return and visit my parents quite often, but Inari-sama _was _grooming me to take over the protection of Fire Country so I rarely did so.

"Twenty years after I was born, and five years after I'd completed my training under Inari-sama because time flows very strangely in Inari-sama's realm, the very first ninja village was founded. I watched as my sister, who I barely knew because she wasn't born until I started my training, married Senju Hashirama shortly after Konoha was founded by the alliance of Uchiha and Senju.

"Shortly after that I met my first mate and had your older sister, Kimiko, who will be celebrating her ninetieth birthday this year. I decided to keep my distance from everyone so I could properly raise her. The next few decades were rather quiet, truth be told. Sure, there were two human wars, but as the kitsune never suffered from either of them, I didn't have a reason to interfere." She sighed. "Perhaps I should have, I don't know." She shook her head. "It won't do to dwell on that.

"It was during the second of these wars that I decided to visit my parents' graves back in Uzushio. They had died shortly after my last visit because of a wasting disease they'd kept secret until it was far too late to treat them." A nostalgic smile appeared on her face. "Stubborn to the last, like true Uzumaki." She shook her head again to get her thoughts back on track. "It was supposed to be a rather routine trip of mourning, so I assumed the form of my younger self in order to not let anyone know I was, in fact, the Kyūbi.

"I should have remembered that_ routine_ trips and missions are the first to go to hell in a hand basket, for Uzushio was attacked and destroyed by a coalition of Kumo, Kiri, and Iwa on the second day of my visit. We gave better than we got, and the army of a hundred thousand versus less than three thousand was whittled down to twenty-thousand. Shortly before the KKI Alliance breached our walls, most of the women that weren't en route to be evacuated killed themselves to be spared the indignity of rape. The rest turned themselves into living bombs to take some of the enemy with them to the grave while saving them from the same indignity." She was so caught up in her memories at this point that she completely missed the stars in the eyes of her son when he heard of the sheer level of badass exhibited by his late clan. Sure, he would miss not being able to properly meet his clan, but they went out the way he himself had always wanted to go out – by his own choice, and with style.

"They took out another four thousand enemy shinobi in their final detonations. To keep up the façade, I allowed myself to be escorted to Konoha with the other refugees and soon joined Konoha's shinobi program." A wistful expression appeared on her face. "It was there that I first met Minato.

"We didn't get along, at first. I thought him a wuss, he thought me a boy in a girl's body. I didn't do much to correct him at the time, I was too busy beating up bullies," she said with a somewhat sheepish grin. He grinned as well, beating up bullies was a perfectly acceptable way to pass the time.

"That changed when Minato was ten. I had, of course, been slowly ageing my human form to not stand out, which had the side-effect of Kumo shinobi thinking I was a jinchūriki like you, rather than _actually a Bijū_. During the month's lull between the second and third round of the Chūnin Exams that were hosted in Konoha at the time, they found me, slapped a high-power Yōki suppressor on me and carried me away. I'll admit to being caught completely off-guard, which was enough for the yōki suppressor to take hold, though it was only geared for seven tails, not nine. It wouldn't have held until Kumo, but Minato didn't know that.

"Minato saw me being carried away, and didn't think twice before sprinting after them and beating them up, despite them being genin and him not even being graduated yet. Naturally, once he tore off the Yōki suppressor I joined him in kicking Kumo ass."

Naruto nodded. "Naturally. A question if I may," he said. When he received a nod he hesitantly asked, "is this Minato my father?"

"He is," she confirmed. "Now shush, the real reason for me being in here and not out there raising you comes soon."

Naruto snapped his mouth shut with an audible click. _I know my father's name! Now where have I heard the name Minato before..._

"Soon after we graduated, now the best of friends and maybe even closer, and your father was assigned Jiraiya of the Sannin as his teacher, along with Hyūga Hizashi and Inuzuka Tsume, while I was apprenticed to Tsunade because I was pretty skilled with medical jutsu, the basics of which were still taught when I attended the Konoha Academy.

"When we were thirteen, Minato and I received our promotions to Chūnin, and I decided to tell him about the real me. To say he was shocked is a massive understatement, but he accepted me, in spite of all the horrible stories about the Kyūbi floating around. I marked him as my mate then and there, and promised him I would help him achieve his ambitions and bear him as many children as time would allow.

"As you may be aware, promises are binding to kitsune. If we give our word, others can expect us to adhere to it unless the other party reneges on it first, which is why we don't give them lightly, and watch our wording when we do. In this case, I fulfilled both my promises; I gave him the son he wanted, and I helped him achieve the right to wear the Hokage Hat."

She stopped and gazed directly into his eyes, as if waiting for him to make a connection. _Minato... Hokage Hat... wait, my father was the – "Yondaime?!" _he exclaimed in shock.

"That's right, musuko-kun," she confirmed brightly. "Now, that _is _an S-rank secret," she continued seriously. "If you thought you had it bad, remember that the civilians of Konoha are _untrained_. Iwa and Kumo assassins are definitely _not._"

Naruto nodded absently with a somewhat paler than normal face, still in shock. _My father was the Yondaime!_ _How cool is that!_

While Naruto was thinking, the visage of his mother twisted. Lips were pulled back, her eyes narrowed, her brows furrowed, and an incandescent rage appeared in the twin pools of brilliant amethyst. It was an expression that would have many people soiling their pants in fear if it had been aimed at them.

Being the focus of the anger of an Uzumaki woman was _not_ something a sane man wanted.

"Now," she continued, her voice close to a growl, grabbing the attention of her son once more. "We had a few good years, but a week after you were born and I'd just returned from the Western Lands to commission the sword Etsu-kun gave to you yesterday, _HE_ came."

Naruto recoiled from the pure venom in her voice when his mother said the word 'he'. Kushina's expression softened slightly when she saw his reaction, but thinking about that man and what he had done never failed to make her angry and vow revenge.

"It was rather foolish of me to travel to the Western Lands so swiftly after your birth, but I wanted to commission the sword as soon as possible, to potentially have it ready for you at your seventh birthday, when I would be starting to teach you the art of the blade. I was not yet recovered from your birth, and would not be for another month, but I took the trip regardless.

"When I returned, severely weakened by the journey, I was attacked by a man I thought long dead, killed by my brother-in-law only a decade after the village's founding. A man wielding an _upgraded_ Mangekyō Sharingan, a concept I didn't think possible but that apparently _was_.

"His name was Uchiha Madara. His **Tsukuyomi**, not a particularly nice genjutsu to begin with, trapped me in my weakened state to be mentally tortured for what felt like weeks before I lost all reason and reverted to my full demonic form."

His jaw was introduced to the floor when his mother mentioned the hated name. _Uchiha Madara is supposed to be dead! _

"Your father knew something was wrong the moment he saw my full form, but nothing he did worked to snap me out of my Sharingan-induced rage. Eventually, he was forced to summon the Shinigami to seal me within you, in hopes that that would break the genjutsu. It did, but at the cost of his life."

Naruto just nodded silently. What could he say to a story like that? He felt his mother wrap her arms around her, swiftly followed by her tails. She pressed her lips to the top of his head and he could faintly hear her mumble, "I'm so sorry I wasn't there for you, musuko, to hold you as you should have been held, to care for you as you should have been cared for, to love you as a mother should love."

He could feel the tears dropping from her eyes, and he wrapped his arms around her tightly, as if to say without words that he had forgiven her.

Truly, he had. It was Madara's fault she wasn't there, not her own. It wasn't her fault that someone with a petty grudge against the village chose to enslave her to destroy it, nor was it her fault that the village had suffered. It wasn't like she was thinking rationally on that night, right?

They remained in that position for a few minutes before her tears dried up and they released each other.

"Ara, Naruto-kun, what do you say we go and visit Saru-jiji?" his mother said with a watery smile.

"Sure, kaa-chan," he replied. Anything to get his mind off the recent revelations for a few moments.

The pair took to their feet, the elder casting an illusion over both their ears and tails. Naruto looked at the space where her tails were, and tried to spot them by channelling chakra to his eyes like his mother had taught him. She had said that kitsune eyes were naturally adept at spotting illusions, but he had to channel absolutely ridiculous amounts of chakra – nearly ninety percent of what he had available to him – into his eyes before he could even see a red haze outlining each tail, never mind the tails themselves.

"This is the power of true kitsune illusions, and you'll not find them better than mine any time soon," his mother said, obviously having seen what he'd been focusing on. "For all my skill with medical jutsu, my true affinity lies in the illusionary arts, though I couldn't really show off kitsune illusions while living in Konoha for obvious reasons."

"Indeed," Naruto said with a nod. "Shall we, then?"

"By all means, let's," she replied and placed a hand on his shoulder. In a swirl of leaves, they vanished.

– – – – _Current Day – – – –_

To say that the Hokage was pleased with his friend's reappearance and so very much _not_ pleased to learn of the continued existence of Uchiha Madara was like saying the ocean was wet.

It didn't even _begin_ to properly describe the situation.

Naruto was brought out of his reminiscence when the door to the classroom opened and team seven's jōnin-sensei entered. The man wore the standard Konoha jōnin flak jacket in forest green, but Naruto got the impression that this individual was as far from the average jōnin as a jōnin was from a five year old civilian child. The rest of his attire did nothing overt to reinforce this opinion; a face mask, hitae-ate slanted to cover one eye, standard shinobi pants – even if they were higher quality than most – and a standard shinobi vest underneath the jacket.

Absolutely nothing he wore, except the face mask and slanted headband pinged Naruto's senses as anything other than 'average', which in itself made him wary. The Hokage would not have assigned an average jōnin to be the sensei to the 'last Uchiha'. Or himself for that matter. It was a barely-kept secret around the Hokage Tower that the Sandaime had been grooming him to take over his spot when Naruto had reached sufficient maturity.

Their sensei turned a lazy eye toward the three children, getting two murder-filled and one assessing glare in return. Evidently finding what he was looking for in his two teammates, the cyclops' sole visible eye turned towards him, and they swapped measuring glances.

Their sensei gave a barely visible nod before he clapped his hands. "My first impression of you is... you're boring. Meet me on the roof in five minutes," he said before he vanished in a swirl of leaves.

Naruto stood up and swiftly walked towards the door, pausing at its frame because his prank sense had just started pinging something fierce.

"What is it, dobe?" Sasuke demanded, having followed the blond.

Naruto didn't respond, but grabbed a kunai and cut a wire barely visible even to his enhanced eyesight. If he hadn't been setting traps that were catching ANBU since he was six, he would have missed it. Two seconds later a tile ahead – the tile they would have been close to had they tripped the wire and continued walking – exploded, spreading paint everywhere in a three foot radius.

"It seems Kakashi-sensei has already started teaching us," he simply said. Sasuke grunted, but Naruto had enough experience decoding Uchiha-style grunting to know that he was pleased the 'dobe' wasn't a total dead weight.

"How do you know his name is Kakashi, Naruto?" Sakura asked curiously. "He hasn't introduced himself yet, and I doubt you can predict the future when not even Sasuke-kun can."

"That's because I was at the Academy when he did his mandatory year-long stint as a teacher, the year before you two started the Academy, Sakura-chan" Naruto replied calmly. The past two weeks had forced him to re-evaluate his life, and he had come to the realization that while he still had a crush on Sakura-chan, she didn't return his feelings at all. He would still try to win her over, of course, because he was stubborn like that. If she grew up to look like his sword's spirit, it was going to be so very much worth it. "His trademark phrase is 'look underneath the underneath'."

"Oh, so _that's_ where it came from," Sakura-chan said.

Without further ado, the trio walked out of the classroom and onto the stairs that led to the roof. They kept a weary eye for additional traps, moving barely faster than normal walking speed. Unfortunately for them, the walk from the classroom to the roof of the Academy took longer to complete than the five minutes given to them. They didn't make it in time, and paid for their tardiness. When they were a few metres from their sensei, who was leaning against the railing reading an orange book and giggling like a pre-teen schoolgirl, he used his free hand to form a one-handed handseal.

A rather large sealing array inscribed on the roof lit up, freezing the three aspiring genin in place before releasing paint bombs at the trio. "Lesson one," he drawled. "Early is on time, on time is late, and late is dead."

Releasing the three pissed off genin from the array, he continued, "However, one should _always_ check for traps. If the party you're meeting is late or you are the late party to a meeting, be mindful of traps and ambushes. It's not unheard of for enemy villages to set up meetings only to ambush the shinobi they're meeting. I used the three hours I was late to set up the array you were just trapped by."

Despite their glares and irritated states of mind because their outfits were ruined just to make a point, the three genin could see the wisdom in the advice and nodded their now partially orange heads.

"Maa, Maa, don't worry, the paint should wash out without problem," he said with a dismissive wave as he clicked the book shut.

"Now then, I think we should introduce ourselves. You know, name, likes, dislikes, hobbies, dreams for the future, all that stuff."

"It's rather rude to demand introductions without introducing yourself, sensei, why don't you go first?" Sakura said calmly, and the three males frowned. Where had the fangirl Sakura gone? Did someone replace Sakura with a body double while they weren't looking?

"You have a point, pinky," Kakashi admitted, while silently wondering why her file mentioned her as a fangirl when she obviously wasn't. "I am Hatake Kakashi, I have a few likes, there isn't much I dislike these days, and my dreams... my dreams for the future are not for your ears yet," he concluded with a giggle. The three genin looked at him with three near-identical deadpan expressions.

'_Typical Kakashi, all we learned was his name.' _

"Why don't you go next then, pinky?" he said with a finger pointing towards Sakura.

"My name is Haruno Sakura, I like... My dream for the future...," blushes and giggles filled the silence. Kakashi groaned softly in tandem with Sasuke.

"Right," Kakashi said soft enough that only Naruto heard, and he was pretty sure Kakashi didn't intend for him to hear. "So the file _does _hold true. Note to self: introduce to Anko and Inoichi." In a louder voice, he asked for her dislikes. _'Inoichi? Gotta ask __k__aa-chan who that is.'_

"INO-BUTA," she yelled, causing the three males to wince at her volume.

"Next up, duck-butt," Kakashi drawled. Sasuke glowered at his sensei but stayed the scorching remark that was sure to be on his tongue. Apparently Sasuke had also noticed the sheer mediocrity emanating from their sensei and drawn the conclusion that he was anything but. Whether that was because he was convinced that he required only the best teachers as an Uchiha 'elite', or because of the accurate conclusion that in the Shinobi world, the more average someone appeared to be, the more dangerous they usually were, Naruto didn't know.

"I am Uchiha Sasuke," he said moodily, and both genin aspirants could swear they saw hearts fly from Sakura's eyes in Sasuke's direction. Sasuke suppressed a shiver. "I like training, I dislike fangirls and those who waste my time, and my dream is to kill _that man_."

Naruto was impressed in spite of himself. Not even thirteen and he could put almost as much venom in his voice when referring to an individual as his century-old Daiyōkai mother. It was well-known that the Uchiha clan was massacred two months before he turned nine, and it appeared Sasuke knew who did the deed. Sakura swooned at his perceived coolness. Did she have multiple personalities?

Kakashi frowned lightly, but nodded regardless. "And you, whiskers."

"I am Uzumaki Naruto," he answered clamly. "I like training and being in the garden, I dislike arrogant idiots who can't look beyond their hatred. My hobbies include gardening. My dream for the future is to utterly destroy those that threaten those I hold dear, past, future and present."

Kakashi nodded again, frown still firmly in place. Sasuke looked at Naruto with a strange expression in his eyes. Sakura just raised an eyebrow, clearly not impressed.

"Right then, meet me at training ground 7 at 0600 tomorrow for your genin exam."

The three genin blinked thrice before Sakura asked what was on all their minds. "But sensei, we already took the genin exam."

"Nope," Kakashi drawled. "You took _a_ genin exam. This is _the_ genin exam. This is the test that determines if you're actually worth the rank of genin, or if you get sent back to the Academy for a year," he explained. His eye shut and formed a sort of inverted 'u', evidently some sort of smile. "Don't worry too much, there's only a 66% chance of failing it," he said cheerily.

Sakura paled. Sasuke gained a determined glint in his eyes, while Naruto displayed no outward reaction to the news. On the inside, however, he was furiously thinking. '_There's something wrong there, but what? __Maybe kaa-chan has the answer.'_

"Ja ne, see you tomorrow. I recommend not eating breakfast," Kakashi said before vanishing in a swirl of leaves.

Naruto turned to his two teammates. "Wanna go grab something to eat?" he asked.

Sasuke grunted a 'no' and walked away without looking back. "Sasuke-kun!" Sakura exclaimed before she ran after him, leaving Naruto alone on the rooftop.

"Guess not," he said with a shrug. As he walked off the side of the Academy building – missing Kakashi's eye widening in surprise from his hiding place in the trees – he wondered what the jōnin had in store for him tomorrow.

One thing he felt fairly comfortable claiming; whatever it was, it was bound to be extremely troublesome.

– **Translations courtesy of :**

_**Musuko: Son**_

_**Akuma Heitei **__**(**_平定)_**: Kai; Demon Suppresion: Release**_

**_U__zushio no Kuni: Country of the Whirling Tides_**

_**Kawaii: Cute**_

_**Hi no Kuni: Country of Fire**_

_**Dobe: dead-last (lit: lowest ranking, worst (in a test))**_

_**Akuma Kokubi no Jutsu: Demon Head Technique**_

_**Shaku: unit of length, approximately 30.3cm. **_

_**Onipō: Chishio Bunshin; Demon Art: Blood Clone. The use of chishio (**_血汐)_** rather than chi **__**(**_血**, blood**_**)**__** specifies that the blood has been spilled from the body.**_

_**R**__**okkan Fūin: Kai; Six Senses Seal: Release**_

_**Kuchiyose: Amatsukajiya: Ōetsu; Summoning: Heavenly Blacksmith: Ōetsu**_

**_O__moikane: God of Wisdom and Intelligence_**

**_Tenjin: God of Scholarship, originally __(and literally) __Sky God._**

_**Seiza: proper sitting.**_

_**Tsukuyomi: Moon Reader**_

_**Mangekyō Sharingan: Kaleidoscope Copy Wheel Eye. **_

_**Buta: pig**_

**_Reiryoku: _Spiritual Power  
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– – – –

**A/N:The scene with the blacksmith was inspired by Chridz's _A Foxes Tale_ (once again). ****Ōetsu and the blade, as you may have guessed, originate in Bleach, my ownership of which is covered in the disclaimer above.**

**Funny how it goes, really. I vow to myself while writing the fourth and fifth chapter of the Ancients from Alchera that my chapters will not break 9k... and then I proceed to write two 10k+ chapters in the span of a few days, this chapter clocking 12k words without author's notes and translations. **

**There will not be bashing of any sort.**

**This fic will undoubtedly be a harem through sheer biological necessity. It will be rather limited in scope, though. Large harems generally mean that a lot of the women's character is lost through the sheer number of characters, which is half the reason most harems simply do not make good reading material. Especially with lemons in a large harem. You can replace A by H and the scene remains unchanged because you almost _have_ to skip out on the details that make each woman unique to fit that many characters; some like to feel passion while other just want straight animalistic romps. Not that I have experience with either, mind, being a virgin.**

**Next update will be somewhere in January, maybe February depending on how much time I have for writing material for my two stories in between studying.**

**I'll see you all in the new year! **


	3. The Real Genin Exam

**Disclaimed: I do not own Naruto.**

**A Kakashi-centric chapter this time, in which he subjects team 7 to the bell test and gets a nasty shock.**

**Updated: 2015-Jan-30**

**Child of the Fox**

The afternoon sun was glaring down on the buildings and residents of Konoha. The village bathed in the fiercest glare the sun could dish out, and everyone felt the heat resulting from the ferocity of its gaze.

That is, everyone except for the handful of individuals currently gathered in the Hokage Office. The person who held the title that granted the office its name saw the thermal distortions in the air and was exceedingly glad that his office had climate-controlling seals. The rest lamented the fact that they had to leave the cool air soon because this was not supposed to be a lengthy meeting. Just confirm whether the teams assigned to them passed or failed and then go back to their respective residences, desperately trying to keep cool on the hottest day in the past five years.

"Alright, everyone," the aged Hokage said to the seven jōnin in his office. There would have been nine but team 5 was failed yesterday because it was obviously not going to work out and the other was Kakashi. Sure, the man had improved since he taught at the Academy, but it was still unlikely he appeared within an hour of the scheduled meeting time. "Test results," he declared, deciding not to wait for the tardy jōnin. "Gemna?"

"Team 1 fails."

"Raidō?"

"Team 2 passes."

"Aoba?"

"Team 3 passes."

"Kō?"

"Team 4 fails."

"Kunugi?"

"Team 6 fails."

"Kurenai?"

"Team 8 passes."

"Asuma?"

"Team 10 passes."

"Sorry I'm late, bratlings held me up," a not-so-apologetic voice sounded from the windowsill. The few that bothered to look towards him, which did not include the Hokage, saw that he was clutching his orange book to his chest like one would cradle a royal baby. A few eyebrows rose to meet hairlines, what had happened to make him stop reading it?

"Glad you could join us Kakashi, and within twenty minutes of the planned starting time too," Hokage-sama said with a _Glare_ that let Kakashi know Hokage-sama was more displeased than usual for his tardiness. Behind his mask and headband, Kakashi frowned. He could feel in his bones the amount of work he was going to need to do was going to go up sharply sometime in the near future. "Team 7?" Hokage-sama asked pointedly.

"Team 7 passes."

Hokage-sama allowed his eyes to widen, and the sound of Asuma's unlit cigarette striking the floor could be easily heard in the aftermath of Kakashi's announcement.

"Are you alright, Kakashi?" Asuma asked hesitantly as he bent to pick up his cigarette. It was well-known that, following his mandatory stint as a teacher, Kakashi had sworn never to teach anyone below chūnin ever again.

"Care to share the details, Kakashi?" Genma asked before Kakashi could answer. "I'm curious what your brats could have done to make you accept them as your students."

Kakashi seemed to shrink in on himself, heightening the curiosity of the seven jōnin and one Hokage in the room. "It was horrible," he uttered in a terrified voice while clutching his book even tighter to his chest. "They ganged up on me and threatened the precious!" he said, yelling somewhat hysterically at the end.

"They got their hands on your smut and threatened to burn it?" Kurenai asked with a raised brow, remembering that team 7 included an Uchiha and the love of fire that that clan held.

Kakashi nodded vigorously with a maniacal look in his eye. Kurenai snorted, "Remind me to buy lunch or dinner for them one of these days."

"Tell me," the Hokage ordered, lighting his pipe. "This I want to hear."

He didn't overly want to, but it was an order from Hokage-sama and defying orders, technically _any_ order, from Hokage-sama was treason and could see him in prison for the rest of his life or executed. Likely execution; he knew too much.

Kakashi nodded reluctantly, and started his tale.

– – – – _That morning – – – –_

Kakashi stepped into the clearing that was training ground seven at exactly 0800, two hours later than he had told the three to meet here. This was to impart upon them a small measure of the art of patience – his files said that none of the three were particularly adept in that field –, and to allow for one of them to get a bright idea and use what he'd taught them yesterday to set up traps. Even if the traps available to them were merely basic traps involving wires, levers, and perhaps pressure plates, sometimes they were enough. Gari, former jōnin of Iwa and ex-leader of the Demolition Corps, found that out himself when a simple wire-kunai trap had pierced his skull during a routine hunter-nin mission that had come across him somewhere in Nami.

Granted, he was severely weakened from multiple elemental dragons and distracted because of the Chidori hurling at him, but it was a simple wire-kunai trap that dealt the killing blow. The basics sometimes truly were the best, and he thanked the little monsters at the Academy for reinforcing that, even if he never wanted to see them ever again in this life or the next.

If they'd asked around they'd know the basics of the bell test since it was used by his teacher, his teacher's teacher, his teacher's teacher's teacher _and _his teacher's teacher's teacher's teacher – in order, Minato-sensei, Jiraiya-sama, Sandaime-sama, and Shodai-sama –, _all_ of them having taught team 7. He doubted they had though, they _were _genin after all. With this information in hand, though it was not guaranteed he would use the same test as his teacher before him, they would have time to prepare accordingly. Let it never be said that Hatake Kakashi was unfairly stacking the deck against friendlies. Well, more than it already was by this being an experienced war-veteran jōnin versus three fresh genin, even if one of them displayed skill he shouldn't have had by walking down the side of the Academy yesterday.

As it was, this batch didn't look all that promising, much like the last two Hokage-sama had tried to foist off on him in between missions. Two of them, the self-proclaimed avenger and the harpy hadn't noticed his presence yet, while the third – the most interesting one – was in a meditative state and doing interesting things with leaves. His fingers were outstretched, the tips equidistant from each other, and a leaf rapidly spun on each fingertip in alternating directions. A leaf lazily spun inside the palm of each hand in the same manner that he had originally used for Rasengan practice, and another leaf hovered, perfectly still, over the back of his hand.

It was, truth be told, rather impressive. It certainly was enough justification for the other two to miss his entering the field even if they should have been more alert. The sole pair of blue eyes, though they had recently taken on a shade of amethyst purple that reminded him so much of Kushina-sama, flashed over to where he was and a strange sensation of pride surged up within him. This was the son of sensei and Kushina-sama, after all. Something seemed off about him, though, but he couldn't place it and he was not keen on exposing Obito's Sharingan because of a _genin_, even if it was sensei's son. Pushing those thoughts aside, he re-focused on the team before him and was not impressed at all much the same as yesterday. Just in case, he had prepared the paperwork requesting sensei's son as his apprentice if this team failed for whatever reason, though he didn't think the consequences of that would be pretty. The Civilian Council _loved_ the 'last Uchiha', and even if they didn't have any direct power over himself, they could still make his life hell if they wanted to. He frowned a bit at the thought as he had not updated his information on the Civilian Council in a few years... ever since Naruto was attacked in that apartment, as a matter of fact. It _could _be that the new Council was not as enamoured with the Uchiha as the former, though he personally doubted it, but he would have to update his information regardless. Leaning on years-old information was a _rookie _mistake, and he was the best the village had!

He walked to a spot directly behind broody and pinky and clapped his hands. It was honestly quite embarrassing that he had to clap his hands, but he reminded himself that they probably didn't know that channelling chakra to yours ears made them sharper. Not on par with an Inuzuka's natural state, but you could hear all but the lightest of footsteps within fifty metres. He was even not walking on the grasstips – another useful control exercise, that – so that he'd have footsteps in the first place.

Broody and pinky jumped up, startled, and he had to restrain himself from laughing. Genin were so easy to scare it was _hilarious_. Naruto simply responded by dropping the leaves where he sat, probably thinking that his smirk was hidden, but it wasn't. It would be best to be cautious, though; pranksters were devious trap-layers, as Iruka had displayed time and again. He was just glad that the kid wasn't capable of fūinjutsu, and suppressed a shiver at the horrors that could erupt when the kid _was_. Luckily, sealing required his permission to be taught if he accepted them – another argument in favour –, unless the kid found some adult Uzumaki somewhere. He rated that occurrence as _extremely _unlikely.

Deep within his mind, he was already planning a holiday should that ever happen. Perhaps to Yugakure? He'd heard that the hot springs there were of excellent quality, as were their women, their booze, and with his record of S-ranked missions he had literally millions stored away. ANBU life may not be the most healthy to the mental state of their operatives, but it certainly was to the coffers of said operatives.

"YOU'RE LATE!" pinky screeched, and he silently cursed his Inuzuka grandmother. Such tones were no longer crippling, but they were _very _annoying. The genes had somehow skipped his father, retaliating by appearing within him at the same strength as an Inuzuka trueborn. It pissed Tsume and her parents off something fierce at the time since he could not be made an actual Inuzuka because he was technically the Hatake Heir, and adopting Heirs was not something that was done.

He noted that he wasn't the only one. Sure, broody had ringing ears because even to normal ears that sort of volume was horrible to the eardrums, but Naruto reacted like he himself had reacted when faced with that sort of volume for the first ten or so times. Which is to say, mild helpings of sakki.

Interesting, that. As a genin, he shouldn't have noticeable sakki even if he was sensei's son. There were also the implications regarding his auditory sensitivity that he could abuse during the test, but he brushed the thoughts aside for now to give the trio his patented eyesmile.

"Sorry about that, I had to help an old lady cross the street." Ah Obito, if only you knew that your bullshit excuses were used to such effect against the next generation of shinobi. You would be beaming with pride before you took Naruto aside and treated him to ramen.

_As an aside, what is it with pranksters and ramen? Kushina-sama loved the stuff, Iruka loves the stuff, Obito loved the stuff, and I've personally guarded Naruto as he wolfed down fourteen bowls of the old Uzumaki special so it's fair to say he loves the stuff as well. _

His random thought train would have continued had they not been derailed by pinky.

"LIAR!" she screeched. Truly, screeching was the proper adjective for her voice.

He decided to mimic Naruto and aimed a – to him – small amount of sakki her way, which shut her up and shut her up good.

Aaah, blessed silence. He stopped emitting sakki and grabbed the two bells from his belt and watched as the three pairs of eyes followed the bells' journey through the air ashe waved them in front of himself. "This test is simple. Your objective is to get these bells from me before this timer, which is set for two hours from now, reaches zero.

"The catch is, of course, that there are only two bells, and three of you. Whoever doesn't get a bell gets sent back to the Academy. In addition to the humiliation of not getting a bell, I will tie the loser to a tree and offer lunches to the other two."

Only two stomachs rumbled and he frowned slightly in disappointment – and pride – that sensei's son hadn't followed his recommendation and skipped breakfast.

"I thought I told you to skip breakfast, blondy," he drawled, piercing sensei's son with a glare.

Said son snorted. "You didn't tell us, you recommended it. As it wasn't an order I was under pressure to follow I didn't, and I wouldn't have even if it was. Not to mention kaa-chan would flay me for forgoing breakfast."

Kaa-chan? But the body of Kushina-sama had disappeared and was never recovered. Did he somehow stumble upon her somewhere? _Note to self: take Naruto aside afterwards. If Kushina-sama survived I want to know. _

"Dobe," broody said in his usual voice.

"Yes, teme?" sensei's son replied somewhat more coldly than Kakashi personally thought sensei's son had ever talked. Apparently the physical changes noted by Iruka were not the only things that changed the past two weeks.

"You don't have a mother," broody replied equally coldly.

As much as Kakashi disliked how it was said, he acknowledged broody had a point. Sensei's son grimaced, and he recognized that particular grimace as belonging to one who had accidentally divulged too much information.

"Obviously I do, because otherwise I wouldn't be here right now," Naruto replied glibly. When broody opened his mouth sensei's son cut him off. "But to actually answer your unspoken question... Circumstances change and my mother was returned to me," he said with a grin.

While outwardly calm, inside Kakashi reeled from the information. _Kushina-sama is alive? _He forced that corner of his mind to the side; he could interrogate sensei's son later.

"So yes," he said, getting the test back on track. As much as he wanted to, tests did not administer themselves. "There's a thirty-three percent failure rate guaranteed," he said, and watched as Naruto's eyes lit up in triumph. Had the kid made the connection? Had he realized the key to success?

Only time would tell. "Now, I want you to come at me with everything you've got. Jutsu, weapons, intent to kill, the works," he said with an interested glance at the sword worn upon the back of sensei's son. It seemed impractically long for his frame, but who was he to judge?

"But sensei, we could hurt you," pinky said. He scoffed. If he was seriously hurt from three _genin_ under any circumstances other than extremely good luck he'd tender his resignation from the force per that instant.

"If you can," he said with an eyesmile, "then I'll tender my resignation. I wouldn't be much of a jōnin if three fresh graduates could seriously hurt me outside of incredibly divinity-backed miraculous luck."

Pinky at least had the decency to blush. "Ready, set... go," he drawled and activated the timer.

Pinky and broody scattered. Pinky was in the bush at the edge of the clearing – even if he _couldn't_ sense her, her pink hair gave her away –, broody was deeper into the forest, but neither was suppressing their chakra to stop others from detecting them. Yet another thing he'd have to teach them.

Naruto, on the other hand, surprised him. He grabbed the hilt of the sword on his back which caused the sheath to _dissolve_ in a fine watery mist. He briefly wondered how resheathing the blade would work before he had to block the blade with a kunai.

Naruto had swung the sword with surprising strength. He estimated that he had to use a fifth of his strength to keep the blade at bay, though there was a nick in his kunai that essentially reduced it to scrap metal in his opinion. Ninja of his calibre demanded perfection in equipment and even scratches were sometimes reason enough to scrap the kunai or shuriken entirely because the balance was off.

He might as well try and get some use out of it. He threw the kunai at a speed that Naruto should be capable of barely dodging and watched as the blond did nothing of the sort. The knife plunged into his shoulder, and the blond was shrouded in smoke.

Kakashi was reluctantly impressed. He hadn't even noticed that the Naruto he'd been speaking to was a shadow clone. The alternative, smokeless and sealless shadow clone creation under his watchful gaze, was utter madness. Even he, with all his experience creating shadow clones to do tasks ranging from fūinjutsu to grocery shopping still required the seal, though he didn't have to vocalize and created copies without smoke.

That left the question of where Naruto was. He hadn't felt... oh. Cheeky little brat couldn't suppress his chakra so he saturated the entire forest area surrounding the clearing in training ground 7 with his chakra so his wouldn't stand out from the ambience. It was far from ideal, but it worked.

He gave them a while to make a plan, and decided to have some fun while he was at it. He reached into a pocket and felt the chakra signatures belonging to pinky and broody tense. His sense was nowhere near the level where he could feel individual emotions like Kushina-sama and Mito-sama were capable of, according to the stories surrounding the latter, but he was skilled enough that he could feel their general mood if they were close by. Whether they were happy, sad, tense, relaxed... that sort of thing.

Where those emotions came from was a blank, whether it was attained vengeance or a won lottery, but in this case he could make a good guess. He felt their signatures change again when he whipped out _Icha Icha_ and picked the story back up from where he had left it the previous day. He giggled as he thought, _Naughty Kimiko-chan, __very naugh-_

He could hear the swishing air behind him, and ducked under the blade sweeping horizontally through the air above him. In his motion, he lashed out with a foot towards the likely source of the swing and was rewarded with a solid hit and the distinctive sound of air being driven from someone's lungs.

"Not bad, blondy," he drawled. "But not good enough."

The scowl on his face as he retreated back into the brush was hilariously adorable. Absently, he noted that Naruto had been taught the grass-tip walking exercise. He really needed to speak with him about his teacher. If nothing else, he needed to know so that they could synchronize their training.

He decided to put away his precious _Icha Icha_ and get some action into the field. The sooner this test was over, the sooner he could put in the paperwork to make his honorary younger brother his apprentice. Broody or pinky? Broody would likely be the hardest target of the two, so that meant pinky had the dubious honour of being his first target. What did her file say about her again?

Ah yes. Sasuke Fangirl and in possession of some form of MPD where the second personality seems to be far more mature and combat-capable, but the triggers, if any, are unknown. Taijutsu below-par, though in possession of bouts of Tsunade-like strength in her punches, genjutsu slightly above-par, ninjutsu practically non-existent outside the Academy Three. He nodded to himself, that would be easy enough. He frowned as the chakra that felt like mud, indicating Water and Earth affinities without the possibility of Wood, move away. He knew it belonged to pinky, but where was she going?

Ah, towards the object of her affections. He performed a quick **Shunshin** to a tree in her path, leaning against the bark. With his precious in hand he giggled like a schoolgirl; it gave him the perfect cover to keep an eye on pinky and her actions. He felt her stop close to him. Eventually, she moved away slowly. Curious, he looked over and saw her tip-toeing out in a manner reminiscent of that bunny-starring cartoon they'd been showing on the television lately.

Bugs Bunny or something like that. It had its moments.

He briefly exposed his Sharingan to cast an illusion. He would have cast this one the standard way, but he was not good enough with illusions to do them silently like Yūhi-san unless he used his eye, and this particular illusion worked best when silent. Lightning jutsu, on the other hand... but that was too drastic. He did not want to kill a fellow Leaf inhabitant.

He watched as pinky looked to her left and screamed before falling unconscious. His illusion cancelled itself and he was informed that she saw broody dying in front of her. He chuckled sadistically and continued walking, switching his thoughts to his next target, conveniently identified by the illusion he had just cast.

Time to deal with broody.

He was an Uchiha, and his file mentioned that he had once said that he 'wasn't a kid anymore'. Taken to its logical conclusion, that meant that, at the very least, he had C-ranked shurikenjutsu and a **Katon: Gōkakyū** under his belt. Perhaps even the Phoenix Flower? Itachi also had the Dragon Fire technique and a whole lot more at the same age as broody was now but as he had once heard his fellow ANBU say 'Itachi is fucking bullshit'. More than once, he agreed.

He heard the swishing sound of weapons flying towards him at a relatively high speed for a genin, but chose to pretend being locked in thought. The weapons nailed his side and their thrower smirked... only to lose that smirk when he replaced himself with a log.

Kakashi resolved to do this more often; the expression of a shocked Uchiha was _priceless_. It was a shame he couldn't imprint it into memory with his Sharingan. Broody realized he had just given away his position and fled, but he was faster and blocked him.

"Where do you think you're going, broody?" he asked.

Broody froze before he smirked the Uchiha Smirk©.

"I'm different from those two," broody said.

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. Smug pride, arrogance... It was like Fugaku reborn. Considering it was his son and this kid had wanted to impress his father before broody's older brother went mad and killed all of the Uchiha except for himself, broody and his mother, though she would never use chakra again in her life, that was entirely possible.

He'd have to break it from him. "Why don't you prove it? By, say, getting a bell?" he said in a tone that never failed that drive Fugaku mad the few times they spoke.

It once again proved effective on his son. With a yell, broody launched himself forward, forgoing any and all precautionary matters. His taijutsu assault, truth be told, was rather impressive for a fresh graduate, even if said graduate was mostly lost to rage. He had obviously been training in the Interceptor Fist favoured by many Uchiha, modified for Sharingan use, with a smattering of Dragon and Tiger Zodiac styles thrown in to offset the current lack of his clan's famed eyes. His speed and coordination were somewhere around mid-high genin, though he left himself wide open when he struck. He impressed Kakashi enough that he let him get close to the bells.

To actually _get_ the bells he needed to be a) be more stealthy, b) be a lot more skilled, or c) coordinate with the others. He grabbed the outstretched fist after a dodged punch and threw him over his shoulder. To his credit, broody recovered fast. Broody put his hands together and flew through a set of handseals at mid-low genin speed, ending on a Tiger seal. Kakashi responded by putting his hands in a modified Ox and waited for the fire jutsu to be launched and block line of sight.

"**Katon: ****Gōkakyū ****no jutsu**."

A large fireball, approximately similar to what Obito was capable of back in the day, was launched towards the jōnin. It was large enough to hide his entire body, so he responded by creating a quick shadow clone and going underground.

Being underground, through either the Underground Fish Projection or the Double Suicide Decapitation that he was currently using, never ceased to be strange. It was comparable to a strange mixture of earth and water with the properties of neither, though he supposed it was somewhat similar to mud. You had to visually confirm the location of your target before you went under, and thus the path you had to travel to them with this jutsu unless you were adept in sensing. He was more adept than most, but that only showed how little sensing actually was taught.

He moved underneath broody and grabbed an ankle before pulling him underground at the same time that he emerged. The effect, when done swiftly enough, was very much like a **Kawarimi**. The end result was broody being stuck up to his neck in the earth while Kakashi stood above ground looking at him.

"Being different does not mean you're better," he said seriously, trying to impart a lesson he was sure wasn't getting through to the kid. "There's always someone better, always someone stronger, and always someone faster than you."

Leaving broody in his natural state, that is to say brooding, he went to find the last person on this team... blondy. Uzumaki Naruto. Sensei's son.

He didn't have to search for long. Within seconds he heard the swishing of a blade once again, coming from his right this time. Not in the mood to waste more equipment blocking, one very expensive high-quality kunai was enough, he ducked. "Maa, Maa, so spirited," he drawled upon seeing the third part of this team, though using the word implied a cooperativity between its elements that was currently lacking.

The gritting of teeth was his only reply. After a few more swings of his sword, it was apparent to blondy that he was not going to hit his future sensei. He put his hands in a modified Ox after placing the sword back on his back. The sheath coalesced from water in the atmosphere around the blade. Very curious, that. He'd have to ask about it later.

"**Kage Bunshin no jutsu**."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow, though none could see it because he wore his hitae-ate over them. A quick count told him that there were _at least_ sixty clones surrounding him. Sensei's son was not even putting on a show of being winded. _Spirits, just how much chakra does he have? _

He made a note to himself to work on chakra control with the blond. Starting big would be best. Lava flows, waterfalls, that sort of stuff.

Dispelling the clones was almost insultingly easy, they didn't draw their swords and their taijutsu was... sub-par, to say the least. As he found out after the smoke from the last clone had dissipated, they weren't meant to be good. They were intended as a distraction.

Broody was gone along with Naruto. No doubt the three were having a good pow-wow on how to get the bells. He channelled chakra to his ears. The forest became _alive_, for want of a better word_. _He could hear the far-off birds, the buzzing of insects, and the gentle sound of the calm river nearby that were otherwise sufficiently halted by the trees to be below normal human detection. He let the sounds of nature fills his ears, and eventually picked up human voices. He homed in on the voices.

".. a jōnin, Sasuke-teme. How are we, not even genin, supposed to deal with him?" the first voice said. That had to be Naruto, no one else at the Academy called broody that according to his files.

"As much as I doubt Naruto-baka's intelligence, Sasuke-kun, even a broken clock is right twice a day," the second voice, obviously female, agreed.

"Hn."

Aah, Uchiha. Ever so eloquent. That one said 'alright, alright, you've got a point. So what?'

"How much wire do you have, Sasuke?" Naruto asked.

"10 metres."

"We can work with that. Sakura, didn't you have that C-rank genjutsu you picked up from Mizuki-teme?"

C-rank genjutsu? Her file didn't say anything about it. Then again, it was apparently taught to her by Mizuki, who was a traitor and therefore often didn't commit actions to paperwork. This could be... interesting. He also would have to grill Iruka if he knew about this. The likelihood of it was low, because the man was a stickler for detail, but he could have simply forgotten to include it in the file.

"I do."

Kakashi cut off chakra to his ears. They had the beginnings of a plan and teamwork, all that they needed to do now was to show that they actually worked together. He was content to wait and react to their plan.

Fifteen minutes later, with only ten minutes left on the clock, they struck. He vaguely heard pinky say **Genjutsu: Narakumi no Jutsu **before the jutsu's trademark leaves swirled around him. Hordes of Gai clones started to materialize in front of him, with none behind him. It was obvious that that was where they wanted him to go, so he instinctively broke the genjutsu and turned around. He was willing to do a lot to see what the brats had planned, but he wasn't about to suffer through hundreds of Youthful challenges.

He soon found himself back in the clearing where this entire test had begun, and he could spot the wire that was obv... actually rather well hidden for genin, and even most chūnin. _Must be Naruto's work. Let's see what happens, shall we? _

Still acting as if he was in the throes of the genjutsu pinky had cast on him earlier, he tripped the wire. Several kunai and shuriken came flying at him from all directions, and he dodged them all with contemptuous ease.

While in mid-air, broody came out of the bushes with his hand clasped in the Tiger seal.

"**Katon: Gōkakyū!**"

Nothing a replacement with a nearby log couldn't solve. Though, the particular log he used to swap with _was_ rather conveniently placed close by and in plain sight...

And yes, another trap. **Kage Bunshin**, this time. In a massive cloud of smoke, thirty clones appeared. During the scuffle that, quite honestly, had Kakashi performing at a far higher level than he originally expected against fresh graduates, he lashed out with a kunai against three clones, and they responded by sliding underneath him. Three seconds later they were dissolved into smoke courtesy of a kunai to the spine, and the third wave of Naruto clones pressed forwa-

**DRIIIING**

Time was up. They were not all that half-bad at the end, all told. Pinky used her limited arsenal to guide his movement, broody forced a replacement to a convenient log close to Naruto, because jōnin or not no-one likes to be on the receiving end of a fireball, who used his clones to disorient him so he could be separated from his bells. Had he chosen a log that _wasn't _the most convenient one, however, the entire plan would've gone up in smoke. A little extra spent chakra beat getting caught in an ambush. Nor did Naruto get the bells that were still joyously jingling on his belt.

Pinky appeared from a bush, and Naruto completed the trio a few seconds later.

"You weren't utter failures at the end," he started to say blandly. "But you didn't get the bells, so..."

"I beg to differ, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto spoke calmly, and held out two bells. Kakashi looked down and saw distinctly saw two silver bells hanging from his belt. They poofed into smoke as he was watching.

"**Kage Bunshin** plus **Henge **to disguise two clones as your bells. The two clones, now bells, were placed on your belt the instant my clones got the actual bells by sliding underneath you," Naruto calmly explained, and threw one bell each to pinky and broody. _Not bad, it seemed he kept his sleight of hand skills gained before that situation at his apartment when he was eight._

"You'll be the only one to go back to the Academy now, you realize that Naruto?" Kakashi said, trying to unnerve the blond. When it failed to work, Kakashi wondered what other ace sensei's son had up his sleeve.

"Not exactly," Naruto continued in that infuriatingly calm voice. He reached into his pouch and withdrew a very familiar book. _I'm so proud of you Naruto! YOU HAVE JOINED THE ICHA-ICHA EMPIRE! _Chibi-Kakashi yelled within his mind.

"Contrary to what you may or may not be thinking, Kakashi-sensei... this is _your_ book." Kakashi's eye widened and he frantically reached into the pouch where he kept his precious. He knew he should have drawn a storage seal for his precious inside his pouch! "Sasuke?"

"Hn," broody grunted. His hands flew through a very familiar seven seals, ending on Tiger. He inhaled deeply, but stopped there. The sole visible eye of Hatake Kakashi widened in horror. _They wouldn't! _

"Pass us or the book gets it, sensei," Naruto threatened.

"You pass!" he yelled out maniacally. He flashed forward at speeds that would make sensei proud and snatched the precious from the hands of the blasphemer.

He swiftly retreated to the edge of the clearing, cradling his precious in his arms.

"Don't worry, the bad men won't be able to get you anymore," he said softly to the precious, gently caressing its divine form. He missed the three sweat-drops on the faces of his genin.

"Meet me here at 0800 tomorrow. Ja ne!"

In a swirl of leaves, Kakashi went home.

– – – –

"... and that's all, Hokage-sama. I immediately went to fix a fatal flaw exposed to me by Team Seven. Drawing the storage seal took only ten minutes," he finished, his voice slightly hoarse.

"And why do you not carry it _inside _the storage seal right now, Kakashi?" Kurenai asked, steadfastly ignoring the Hokage making a note that looked suspiciously like 'storage seals are a good idea'.

"Because the precious needs comforting!" he yelled in return. Kurenai palmed her face, grumbling to herself.

"Naruto hasn't let up on his deviousness, I see," Hokage-sama said with a chuckle. "You're all dismissed except Kakashi."

In a series of synchronized swirls of leaves, all jōnin that had been given leave left.

Hokage-sama sighed, and Kakashi blinked a few times in rapid succession. It was not often that Hokage-sama let his age show in his demeanour. Hokage-sama made the handsign that told the ANBU guarding him that he wanted to be left alone with his guest. Four leaf-filled swirls later, the office was empty except for Hokage-sama and himself.

Kakashi frowned when Hokage-sama ran through a short sequence of handseals and activated the privacy seals. This _could not possibly _be good.

"I did not want to unduly pressure you before you had passed your team, Kakashi, but now that it has I have no more excuses to keep pressure off you," Hokage-sama began in a voice that showed his age more than Kakashi had ever heard, even on the night he re-took the mantle after Minato-sensei had sacrificed himself to seal the Kyūbi. Kakashi wanted to speak, but a _look_ from his leader stayed his tongue.

"I am old, Kakashi, and tired. I do not expect to live out the decade whatever happens. Unfortunately, there are several large problems left in the village. Until recently, Naruto being a high-level flight risk was one of them, but thanks to the efforts of Anko and Kurenai, along with a revelation two weeks ago this is thankfully no longer the case."

"Does this revelation have to do with Naruto's mentioning a 'kaa-chan', Hokage-sama?" Kakashi asked.

"It does. I don't doubt that you're going to talk to him about it and you're going to be pleasantly surprised. I won't say more on that. To get back on track, you still have the flight-risk that is Uchiha Sasuke, I trust you know what to do to break him of his delusion that the Uchiha are superior to everyone," Hokage-sama said.

Kakashi nodded. "Physically demanding jobs well away from the village where the people really couldn't care less that he is an Uchiha and a harsh training regimen. Maybe a Tora or two to start."

"Exactly. However, that is not all of your upcoming struggle. It is time for me to once again retire as I _should still be_, but the person I want to pass the mantle to is too young."

"Naruto," Kakashi said firmly. It was not exactly a secret that Hokage-sama had been grooming Naruto to take over as Godaime.

"Indeed," Hokage-sama agreed. "However, even disregarding Naruto-kun's lack of age there is his lack of experience. As he is now, Naruto-kun _cannot _take over as Godaime. As Rokudaime, however..."

Kakashi saw where this was going and his mind went into overdrive. Successors were generally selected through apprenticeships or the jōnin pool. There were only a few candidates that fit either. Naruto, himself, Asuma, Gai, Jiraiya, and Tsunade. Naruto was too young an inexperienced despite being a semi-official apprentice to the Hokage, Gai was...

Kakashi had no doubt Gai had the right mentality to become Hokage, but feared what a Youthful Hokage would do to the village. If Gai accepted, of course. He might as well claim that the holding the office of Hokage would dampen his Youthful flames or something along those lines.

Asuma was not interested, as was Jiraiya, and hell would have to freeze over before Tsunade would set foot in the village again let alone hold the office of Hokage.

That was not mentioning ex-shinobi candidates, but they were even worse than a Godaime Gai. He shuddered to think what would happen to Konoha under a Godaime Danzō.

That really left himself. _Kami-sama save me_. "You want me to take over as Godaime," Kakashi said bluntly.

"Indeed," Hokage-sama confirmed with a nod. "But even as you are now you are not an acceptable candidate. You have stagnated, Kakashi. Inu was a solid S-rank shinobi worthy of being my successor, but Hatake Kakashi has been a middling high A-rank shinobi. See to it that this is rectified."

Kakashi nodded.

"If necessary, break Haruno Sakura. Your team is meant for heavy combat and right now she's a liability."

Kakashi hummed. "I think a lot of what's wrong is her dieting in a misguided attempt to keep her figure. Perhaps I'll introduce her to Anko."

Hokage-sama nodded. "Do whatever you think is wise or necessary, Kakashi. Just get all three to a point where they can dominate the chūnin exams coming to Konoha eight months from now. I've got a bad feeling in my gut whenever I think of them, and my gut feelings tend to be correct."

Kakashi nodded. "I can do that," he assured his leader. "Permission to leave?"

"Granted."

Kakashi left in a swirl of leaves. His blond student owed him answers and he felt in his bones that they were not going to be short ones.

– – – –

Kakashi found the object of his search not even five minutes later furiously enjoying a ramen binge. He silently took a seat next to him, his mind remembering the little fully-blond ball of sunshine gorging himself on ramen.

"Kakashi-sensei," Naruto said with a nod.

"Naruto," he returned likewise. "Once you're finished, I want to speak with you. One miso, please."

"Alright," Naruto replied evenly after finishing his bowl. "What about?"

"I want to talk about a few things with you, including this 'kaa-chan' you mentioned," Kakashi said as Ayame placed a bowl of miso before him. "Thanks," he said with an eyesmile directed her way.

"Alright," Naruto said as he started on his last bowl for the day. "I know a private place where we can talk. I'll send a clone ahead." He placed his chopsticks on the counter and created a clone that swiftly took off.

A short while later the two left behind two empty bowls of ramen, one of them patting his full stomach.

"Where to, Naruto?" Kakashi asked. When Naruto still had not answered his question a minute later, he aimed his sole uncovered eye on the blond and found him zoned out.

Naruto shook his head as focus returned to his eyes. "Training ground 43, behind the waterfall, sensei."

_There's something behind the waterfall at 43? _This was news to him. He placed a hand on the shoulder of his student and the pair vanished in a swirl of leaves.

They reappeared in the same way a few metres from the waterfall in question.

"I'd prefer a warning next time, sensei," Naruto grumbled.

"Maa, maa, don't be so stressed Naruto," he said with his customary eyesmile.

"Whatever," the blond said with a shrug. "Follow me, and don't touch any of the plants. Bad things happen to those who do."

"Plants?"

"You'll see, sensei. Now come on," Naruto said with a motion of his hand to indicate the silver-haired shinobi should follow. Kakashi looked on in surprise as Naruto stepped on the water and walked on as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

_Note to self: scratch water-walking for sensei's son. _

Kakashi projected a screen of chakra above his head to prevent the waterfall from drenching him, earning a soft grumble from his student.

"Welcome to the garden, sensei," Naruto said with a sweeping wave of his hand.

Kakashi was silent. His sole visible eye was wider than it had ever been. The plants in this garden seemed literally out of this world. He recognized something that was likely a mutation of the Kusa-native strychnine, Iwa-native almonds farmed extensively for their cyanide content, castor beans commonly found in the mists of Mizu no Kuni, and several plants he was sure had some sort of demonic origin. Other plants were more... _foreign_.

At least, he didn't think the red-green-blue-yellow-pink-black plants with a geometry that hurt his eye just from looking at it could be found anywhere outside this garden.

– – – –

In the Eastern Lands, a seven-tailed fox tending a lavish garden sneezed, sending strangely-coloured butterflies scattering everywhere.

– – – –

With awe evident in his eye, he numbly followed the blond while trying to take in as much of the garden as he could. More than once, he had to remind himself that his student had warned him that touching these plants was a _seriously bad idea._

"Kaa-chan!" aforementioned student yelled. "I'm home! I brought a guest as well!"

"I'm in the living room!" a voice yelled from inside the house the appeared in the distance. Kakashi nearly jumped. _That voice... That was..._ his thoughts screeched to a halt. _How?_

Watching warily as Naruto opened a traditional shogi door, Kakashi followed his favourite non-adult into the house. His eye fell on the woman sitting on the couch with a cup of tea that smelled absolutely delicious and so very much like the flavour Kushina-sama favoured. It was then that he took in the features of the woman, who had since turned her head to gaze upon the guest in their not-so-humble abode.

He noticed her red hair. Her lithe frame with generous bust. Her amethyst eyes locking onto his sole black one, sparkling with unrestrained mirth and joy and... _affection_? The roundness of her face that had always been a very sore topic in combination with her hair. He remembered some of the beatings she dished out to enemies in the field as well as stories from bullies at school that called her 'tomato'. He saw the near-motherly affection from her eyes directed his way.

"Hello, Kakashi-chan," she said, her voice reflecting what her eyes told the world.

_This can't be! Kushina-sama is dead! _

He put his hands together in a Ram seal and pulsed his chakra multiple times in an effort to break the genjutsu he was sure was cast on him. When her visage didn't waver in the slightest even after his strongest pulse, he leapt at her with a kunai in hand, snarling like a dog.

Pressing his blade to the woman's throat, he looked at the woman who had the audacity to wear Kushina-sama's face.

"Who are you?" he demanded with death in his eye and voice.

"I am..." She coughed and turned to the watching blond. "Cover your ears Naruto, or you will never have use of them again," she ordered the blond with a threatening glance to back it up. Startled, Naruto covered his ears with his tails and hands.

Kakashi frowned.

Tails? And this woman that looked like Kushina-sama had them as well. He mentally slapped himself for not noticing the tails before.

What in the nine Hells was going on here?

The woman leaned in as much as the knife pressed to her throat allowed her, and softly whispered to him, "Kushi-kaa."

His sole visible eye widened.

"_You know we won't mind if you call us Mina-tō – hehe – and Kushi-kaa, yes?" Kushina-sama asked when Obito and Rin had departed. _

"_With all respect, Kushina-sama, I couldn't possibly call you something that intimate after all you've done for me," he'd replied seriously. "__Nothing but the most absolute respect will."_

"_Mū, don't be such a downer, Kashi-chan. No one's going to die because you broke propriety inside this house," she said with a whiny pout. "_We_'re not going to be mad if you call us your parents, Kashi-chan."_

The hand holding the blade shook. "H-How?" he stammered, before forcing his mind to compartmentalize. He could break down later. Like, say, when sensei's son wasn't there to witness it. He had an image to maintain.

Her eyes turned sombre. "That is a long story, Kashi-chan," she replied. He dropped the blade and half-staggered back into a conveniently placed chair. "It starts nearly a century ago..."

– – – –

"So to recap: you were born a human with a crippling disease, a prayer by your parents was listened to and you were bonded with Inari-sama's oldest daughter and became the new Kyūbi. Later, you assumed a human guise and went back to Uzu a few days before it was destroyed, after which you ended up in Konoha looking like a human child and enrolled in the shinobi program. Nearly two decades after that, after you'd given birth to the _Hanyō _Naruto and sealed his demonic blood, a masked man claiming to be _the _Uchiha Madara appeared and mentally tortured you until you went berserk, after which you were sealed into Naruto by Minato-sensei?" he asked incredulously. It was an outlandish tale, but Naruto acted as if it was true and the few times he guarded Naruto when he was younger told him that Naruto had a nose for bullshit.

"Pretty much," she confirmed. "Though there is one glaring error in your recap."

"Which is?"

"He didn't _claim _to be Uchiha Madara, as far as I could tell he _was _Uchiha Madara."

His jaw met the floor. "How?"

"I don't rightly know," Kushina-sama replied with a tail scratching the top of her head. "But his and Hashirama-nii's clash back in the Valley of the End killed rather a lot of my charges; we were fond of the plain that became the Valley. I memorized Madara's chakra then and the man that appeared before me twelve years ago had the _exact _same chakra."

Kakashi shivered involuntarily, desperately trying not to dwell on this. An immortal Uchiha Madara was the stuff of nightmares. Before he could ask if Sandaime-sama knew, a temporarily forgotten voice called out.

"Kaa-chan," Naruto said from the third piece of furniture in the room, startling both of them. Three eyes turned towards him.

"Yes, musuko-kun?"

"I just noticed something odd," he said with a frown. "Earlier, when I first swam to this place, you told me about grandfathers, great-grandfathers, and great-great-grandfathers, all of them confirmed kitsune." Mother and son tilted their heads in unison; one wondering where this was going to, the other in curiosity. "But when you told me your story a few days later, and just now to Kakashi-sensei, you said you were bonded to Inari-sama's, the First Fox, oldest daughter. How does that work?"

A second tail joined the one already scratching the vibrant red hair belonging to Kushina-sama as she adopted a thinking expression. After a few minutes of thought, she said, "I don't honestly know, musuko-kun. I thought of a few ways in which it can happen, but without conclusive proof I can't tell for sure."

Naruto nodded, his curiosity satisfied for now, and turned to Kakashi. "So, sensei, you said you wanted to talk to me for more reasons than just my mentions of kaa-chan."

Kakashi nodded. "I did," he said. "But most of that related to your training. I'll need to coordinate with Kushina-sama so that my training team 7 doesn't conflict with your training under her." He flashed his student his best eyesmile.

Kushina-sama rounded back on him. "That's right, you had kawaii genin now! Tell me about them!" she demanded in much the same tone she'd used when she asked of Obito, Rin, and himself who'd stolen the cookies from the jar when they had stayed over after a training session with Minato-sensei.

"There isn't really that much to tell, really," he said with a shrug. "Pinky, Haruno Sakura, is a stereotypical civilian graduate, one of the three leaders of the Uchiha Sasuke Academy Fanclub, though she does have a useful c-rank genjutsu in her repertoire. Broody is Fugaku's second son, and is basically him reincarnated but with an oath to kill his brother."

Kushina-sama blinked. "Haruno?"

"Yup," he confirmed with a nod. "She's got pretty good chakra control, but her pool is... _tiny._ Truth be told I'm surprised she had the chakra for the Hell Viewing Technique."

"Huh. Pink hair, larger-than-average forehead, MPD, scarily intelligent when circumstances call for it?"

He shrugged. "Can't say much about the intelligence, but the rest fits."

"She's got the intelligence," Naruto assured them both.

Kushina-sama started giggling. Kakashi turned to Naruto for an explanation, but saw that his eyebrows were raised as well. "Oh this is _priceless_!" she exclaimed. "To think that _her_ line was reduced to a single Uchiha fangirl!" She wrapped her tails around herself and started rolling on the floor, deafening them both with the volume of her howling laughter.

"What do you mean, Kushina-sama?" he asked curiously. Waiting patiently for a reply, he watched as the next handful of minutes the sounds of unrestrained joy coming from the ball of humanoid fox filled the room.

"Part of the reason the Northern Fox Clan settled in Hi no Kuni instead of somewhere else was because of the presence of the Haruno," she said when she had calmed down, and two jaws met the floor. "Of course, they weren't called the Haruno back then, but I kept an eye on that line regardless until I was sealed inside Naruto-kun."

"Why?" he and Naruto asked in unison.

Kushina-sama grinned the same fox-like grin he often saw adorning the face of sensei's son whenever they found significant amounts of humour in a situation. "That would be telling," she said brightly.

Kakashi and Naruto looked at each other with deadpan expressions. "Very helpful, kaa-chan," Naruto said dryly.

"I know. So," she said in an obvious attempt to change the subject. "You said something about training synchronization?"

He nodded absently. Despite his best efforts, his mind was still off-kilter from the earlier stream of revelations, and it must have showed somehow. Kushina-sama had always been able to read his face without fault, seeing even the deepest hidden emotions.

"Naruto, leave us," Kushina-sama ordered. Naruto nodded.

"I'll be in the garden, working on my bladed kata," he replied as he stood up and walked out of the building.

After he had left, Kushina-sama placed herself on the couch next to him. The next thing he knew, she had wrapped her arms around him and soon followed up with her tails. Feeling the motherly warmth she radiated, the part of him that was still an emotionally stunted twelve-year-old in desperate need of parental affection took over and he leaned into her embrace.

For the first time since his father committed seppuku, Hatake Kakashi cried.

– – – –

**Nami: Wave, in this case Nami no Kuni, or the Country of Waves**

**Chidori: Thousand birds**

**Rasengan: Spiraling Sphere**

**Sharingan: Copy Wheel Eye**

**Shunshin: Body Flicker**

**Katon: Gōkakyū; Fire Release: Great Fireball**

**Genjutsu: Narakumi no Jutsu; Illusion Arts: Hell Viewing Technique.**

**Ja ne: See ya (approximately. It's slang for 'see you later', which I understand as stated outside brackets)**

**Wakatta: Understood/ I understand.**

**Kawaii: Cute **

**Sakki: Killing Intent**

**Seppuku: Ritualistic suicide (also known as Harakiri). One takes a short blade, usually a tantō, and slices one's own stomach open from left to right without flinching. The ritual is completed by then reaching inside oneself and removing one's own bowels before dying, again without flinching. Also performed by making the initial cut and then having a second chop off the head of the person committing seppuku.**

– – – –

**A/N: I've always felt that illusions should give some feedback when they're dispelled so that the illusionist can use what the illusion displayed to further their assault. For genjutsu like the Hell Viewing, which is an auto-suggestive illusion of your worst fear according to the wikia, I consider this behaviour practically a necessity.**

**As for the scene at the end, this universe's Kakashi was a lot closer to Minato and Kushina than he appeared to be in canon. I don't think that people who had their parents ripped away from them, especially those who aren't very capable of processing their emotions in the first place, stop craving parental affection of some sort (though I obviously can't say for sure as my parents are still happily among the living). With his ties to Minato and Kushina much closer than they ever were to his biological mother and father – both of them dead before he was six – I don't think the scene is unlikely as written. **

**I also hope I sufficiently conveyed the fact that the only student Kakashi is actually interested in teaching is Naruto by never referring to Sakura and Sasuke by their given names, except to clarify to Kushina who they are. Also, the paperwork.**

**This chapter concludes Genin Days Arc 1: Graduation Shenanigans. **

**Next chapter starts Genin Days Arc 2: D-rank _suck. _Also, training.**

**I don't expect to spend more than one or two chapters on it, but I didn't expect this story to start with two 10k+ chapters either.  
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**To readers of my other active story, the Ancients from Alchera, Chapter 5 has been delayed because of approaching exams and a lack of inspiration. Expect it in February unless I get a fresh dose of +10 inspiration and finish it in two hours or so.**


	4. The First Day

**PSA: When I say 'first floor' at the start of this chapter, I mean the British first floor, which is equal to the American second floor. **

**This convention will hold any time floors are mentioned anywhere in this fic. **

**PSA 2: The previous chapter has been updated to include information that I just realized I forgot to mention. It's not that much (only twenty-ish words), but they reflect Kakashi's interest in everything not shinobi. That is, he allowed himself to form opinions based on years-old information (words added after the mention of 'the Civilian Council _loved _the 'last Uchiha'). **

**In this chapter: a little slice of normality in the abnormal life of our protagonist, a competent Kakashi-sensei, and... Enter, Mitarashi Anko!**

**Updated 2015-Jan-31 to include things I forgot.**

**Child of the Fox**

The village of Konoha was, on the whole, a quiet village. If one ignored the cries of Youth from two of the more eccentric shinobi, one could say that Konoha was downright idyllic, especially considering the fact that Konoha was a _shinobi_ village.

The house hidden in a cave behind the waterfall in one of the numerous training grounds of Konoha was little different. There were plants, even if they weren't exactly recognizable to humans that hadn't visited any of the five other landmasses. There was a house built in traditional Japanese architecture, complete with its own training ground, underground explosion-proof bunker - though it was meant to _contain_ explosions, rather than keep them out -, and provided with outside light through the magic of fuuinjutsu.

The tranquillity of this cavern was not to last in the morning hours of this fine spring day as a figure inside the house left the breakfast fish on the grill and filled a bucket with ice-cold water, before whistling a merry tune as she ascended the stairs to the first floor, careful not to spill any of the contents of the aforementioned bucket.

She opened one particular door at the top of the stairs and stepped inside and nearly cooed when she saw the adorable curled-up form of her son on top of the sheets, clutching one of the plushies she had bought twelve years ago before in preparation for her son being born. She wasn't exactly sure what it meant that he preferred the nine-tailed fox that closely resembled her full vulpine form, but chose not to dwell on its implications.

An evil grin appeared on her face as she shifted her grip on the bucket, readying herself to throw its contents over his form.

"RISE AND SHINE, MUSUKO-KUN!" she yelled before throwing the bucket of ice-cold water over her son's awakening body.

"What the hell, kaa-chan?" Naruto said sleepily while his brain was booting itself. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes and glared at his laughing mother.

"Being woken up with a bucket of ice water is practically an Uzumaki tradition, musuko-kun," she said brightly as she threw him a towel. "Breakfast will be ready in ten."

She walked out of the room and closed the door before breathing a sigh of relief and continuing on to the kitchen. Her son's pheromones were subtle, but they were very clearly present to her nose. Granted, it was because she was a Kitsune _and_ he was a young unmated Kitsune – even if only half, it was enough – that she was so affected, but if he turned seventeen and still had no mates, then the pheromones would ramp up to affect _every_ species of girl, not just Kitsune. Not that she would let it go that far.

She fully intended her son to have at least two Kitsune mates before he reached his seventeenth.

He had more healing to do, however. Right now Naruto-kun was not ready for the full Kitsune experience, though she resolved to have him be somewhat trained to resist seduction before he left the village on his first C-rank in a month or two, according to Kakashi's planned schedule. Demons roaming free were not exactly common, but far from rare, and she would not put it past a young Kitsune girl – the Neko kept to Kaminari no Kuni, the Tanuki kept to Kaze no Kuni, and the other six were predominantly male so kept their females well within clan borders – to manipulate things so that he gave her a mating mark in the heat of the moment, as Kitsune males – half or otherwise – were very possessive of their mates regardless of how they became involved with them and his almost inevitable nine tails would grant any female a significant amount of protection from harm. The only real danger of getting a mate when he wasn't ready for it would be the first, which could be given on instinct before it stabilized the more primal instincts of the male Kitsune mind, loosening the hold instinct had over the creation of mating bonds.

In fact, tricking a Kitsune male into giving away their first mating bond was almost applauded since they _were _foxes when all was said and done. However, once the mating bond was in place the Kitsune in question – at least the female, due to their limited masculine numbers – was compelled to remain loyal to the bond to the point of it being a biological imperative. A bond was a promise, though the details differed depending on gender, and the relationship between Kitsune and promises of any kind was one of the few things the various legends got consistently right. In the meantime, she would train him to resist seduction.

It wouldn't outright eliminate Naruto getting a mate he wasn't ready for, but seduction resistance training would help him in avoiding situations where he was at risk of getting such.

Ten minutes after she had left his room, Naruto dragged himself into the kitchen and sat himself down at the kitchen table they had reserved for breakfast, his hair dishevelled and his shirt on backwards. She giggled, and he turned a stink eye in her direction that caused her to giggle even more. Her son was not a morning person at all. "So, excited for today, musuko-kun?" she asked. "I mean, it is your first day as a genin after all."

"Hell yeah I am!" Naruto yelled excitedly, his fatigue forgotten by the prospect of _actually being a genin!_

"That's good," she said while scratching his head with one of her tails in a manner similar to a human parent ruffling their child's hair. "Keep up the enthusiasm, you're going to need it."

"Mom!" he exclaimed with a blush, swiping at the tail with one of his own. "I'm not three anymore!"

"I know, musuko-kun," she said without stopping, accidentally capturing his tail with her own. A blush threatened to appear on her face, _oh if only you knew what this meant in Kitsune society, Naruto-kun,_ she thought like a hormonal teenager. _That reminds me, I need to start _those _lessons too. He's practically going to be the Kitsune-taichō under Inari-Sōtaichō and he needs to be ready for the duties that come with that office. _"But I've got more than twelve years to catch up on so deal with it."

Naruto threw up a minor illusion of a pouting face, supplemented by his own attempt at the Kit Eyes, the Kitsune equivalent of the well-known Puppy Dog Eyes, to much the same effect. It was, in truth, the exact same thing but the Kitsune and the Inu clans did _not _get along, so they made their own technique to accomplish the feat.

_Sometimes, _Kushina thought, _it is funny that the Kitsune – who are technically canine – get along better with the feline clans than other canine, with the exception of the wolves and jackals. _

While he may have been outwardly protesting, inside his mind Naruto was practically dancing with joy that there was someone that cared for him. It had been two weeks and change since he had first met his mother, but moments like this never got old. Moments like this made him realize that this was what a _normal _family was like _all the time._

"What can you tell me about Kakashi-sensei, kaa-chan?" he asked curiously.

Kushina hummed thoughtfully as she placed breakfast on the table. Nothing really special, just rice and grilled fish, only unique in the fact that there was a lot of it. "Most of his life is his own to tell, musuko-kun," she chided gently. "But the man is an unapologetic pervert, is fond of Maito Gai despite what everyone else thinks and whatever he says, and is quite possibly the single-most skilled ninja in the village that isn't the Hokage. And he's lazy, I guess, but you already knew that from when he was teaching you for a year in the Academy."

"I did," he confirmed as he broke apart two chopsticks. "Itadakimasu."

"Itadakimasu," she said in return. For the next several minutes they ate while making only a little small talk, each savouring the taste and scent of the meal. Eventually, Naruto grabbed the last bit of fish in his chopsticks and was absently bringing it to his mouth when his chopsticks' journey to his mouth was halted. He broke out of his food-induced reverie and looked at the fish.

Two wooden chopsticks that didn't connect to his hands had grabbed the fish and were pulling it away from him. "I don't think so, Naruto-kun," his mother said with a Glare.

He returned the glare as best he could, but failed to meet his mother's level. Quite understandable really, he was having a glaring contest with someone who had a literal century of life on him.

Instead he growled, and an inquisitive part of his mind noted the odd scent that appeared shortly after he did so. It was a pleasing scent, strong traces of pineapple and other sources he couldn't readily identify.

"I'm not giving my fish up that easily, kaa-chan," he half-snarled, and a playfully vicious grin appeared on his mother's face.

"Bring it, musuko-kun."

Their play-fight for the last scrap of breakfast lasted for all of fifteen seconds when a loud ring filled the air. Four eyes turned to the one who had dared interfere with long-delayed mother-son bonding.

_07:45_

"Gotta go kaa-chan!" Naruto said hurriedly as he swiftly snatched the fish out of his mother's chopsticks and wolfed it down before jumping up and sprinting away, applying an illusion to hide his tails and ears as he ran.

"See you later, Naruto-kun!" she yelled after his retreating back. When she felt he had passed the waterfall she slumped down with a sigh.

"His pheromones truly are nothing to sneeze at," she muttered with a groan. "I've gotta change panties and I have fifteen minutes to do so and make myself sort-of presentable before Hiashi. Good thing I don't exactly have to physically apply make-up like most others do, but make-up illusions are always a pain. So many little details to balance, rather than just ensure that they're there."

Releasing another sigh, she stood up to change clothing.

– – – –

Naruto entered the clearing ten minutes after he sprinted out of the kitchen and frowned. His two teammates were already gathered. Since it was 0755, that was not entirely out of line with expectations, especially given their sensei saying 'early is on time, on time is late, and late is dead' two days ago. No, his frown was not because of the presence of his two teammates.

It was because sensei was already there as well. He put his hands in a Ram seal and briefly pulsed his chakra. When the chakra washed over the form of his sensei and said form did not waver, he figured that it had to be a _very good _genjutsu. He swiftly palmed a kunai and prepared to give himself a shallow cut along the palm. Pain was the most crude, but also the most effective way to dispel genjutsu.

That did not change when dealing with Kitsune illusions cast on the mind. Illusions on the world and self – that is, body – adhered to different rules.

"Maa, maa," Kakashi-sensei said in a calming voice. "There's no need to get so drastic, Naruto. By the way, your shirt is on backwards."

Naruto looked at his shirt and cursed softly, but resolutely turned his attention back to his sensei after he had swiftly fixed his shirt and turned a stink eye to his sensei. "Then who are you?" he asked accusingly. "The Kakashi-sensei I know would _never _be less than an hour late, let alone five minutes early."

Kakashi-sensei grimaced unseen beneath his mask. "Hokage-sama's orders," he said curtly. "Now, lets get to training, shall we?"

The three genin nodded. "The first week we will train from 0730 to 1300, at which point we will do one or two missions and have lunch before returning to the training field until 2000, at which point you will return home. The only exception is today since I've got paperwork to do regarding this team, so we'll stop at 1800 instead. This first week I will be supplying bentos to the three of you for lunch and send you home with strict dietary requirements. Fail to adhere to these requirements and I _will_ know, and you _will. __N__ot. __L__ike. It," _Kakashi-sensei said and Sakura gulped from the threat in his voice at the end. Last Naruto heard she was still dieting in an attempt to stay thin to attract the romantic favour of Sasuke-teme and Kakashi, like all shinobi male and female chuunin and higher, felt dieting was a ridiculous waste of time. If you were gaining weight eating however much you wanted, as long as you ensured that you took in enough of everything necessary, then you were not training hard enough. Only time would tell if Sakura would get the message.

"After the first week, you are expected to fill your own bento boxes. Failure to adhere to the dietary requirements of your training will not be punished by me directly, but it will cause you to lag behind in training, an act which _will _bring down my wrath. Understood?" Kakashi-sensei asked them with a piercing glare.

All three of them nodded frantically, though the satisfied smirks on the faces of Naruto and Sasuke were missed by neither party in the clearing. Sakura looked rather frantic, and it did not take a genius to realize she was worried over her figure.

Kakashi-sensei nodded with a satisfied eyesmile. How he could make his eyesmiles as expressive as other people's normal smiles, Naruto would never know. "You're not the only ones to suffer, though. When I said 'we', I _meant _'we'. I've been ordered to re-intensify my own training, and I will do so after I've got a good indication where you are right now." He clapped his hands. "Alright then, first up is physical fitness. You will perform pushups at the highest pace you are capable of until your arms refuse to cooperate," he ordered them. "You will count out loud each time you complete a push-up. After that, it will be sit-up with the same demands. Finally, you will be running laps around the clearing for as long as you can. Now get to it!" he finished with a barked order.

The three genin scrambled to obey, and by the time the three genin finished their push-ups, it was evident that the three were at very different levels physically. Sakura had collapsed somewhere around her fifteenth push-up and was desperately guzzling from her water-filled canteen while the other two soldiered on into the forties. "Relax, pinky," Kakashi said shortly after she had started drinking. "You'll only hurt yourself if you drink water at that pace this soon after a workout."

Sakura nodded absently and complied, though the rate at which she drank her water now would still be considered fast by normal standards it was enough to satisfy Kakashi for now. Meanwhile, Sasuke had crashed to the earthen floor after panting out the number seventy-two and was now lying on his back breathing hard.

When Naruto reached two hundred and fifty with no sign of slowing down any time soon, not even a single bead of sweat visible anywhere on his body, Kakashi called out a halt. Both Sakura and Sasuke were looking at Naruto with wide eyes, and one of the Universal Genjutsu, type: depressed raincloud, floated above the pink hair belonging to Sakura at her own lacking performance. Kakashi almost sighed, that girl and her multiple personalities that switched seemingly at the drop of a hat were going to be the death of him. _Perhaps I'll introduce her to Anko-__s__an this afternoon instead of next week? _

A moment later, he nodded to himself and created a Kage Bunshin for the purpose of seeking out Anko. She owed him a few favours so unless she was busy breaking a fool or three she would answer favourably.

Both of the other genin had known Naruto was an unreal stamina monster, but they were unaware of the true magnitude of the situation. Kakashi just looked at the genin with a – hidden – raised eyebrow. With the heritage he was aware of years ago and the heritage he only learned of yesterday, his performance wasn't completely a surprise.

The sit-ups were a story of 'second verse, same as the first'. Sakura laid herself spread-eagle on the floor after number twenty, panting heavily, Sasuke stopped at sixty, and Naruto was still counting at one hundred and seventy-five. Thanks to the regenerative properties of yōki on the human or half-human body in addition to his standard Uzumaki healing factor Kakashi would not be surprised if he could maintain this for an entire day.

Kakashi made a mental note to keep the blond genin well away from Gai.

"Alright, that's enough Naruto," he called. "Time for laps!" he said cheerily after the blond had come to a halt.

The third verse was, once again, same as the first. Sakura started walking and splashing water on her face to cool down at ten laps, Sasuke lasted twenty, and Naruto just kept on running and running.

Kakashi scratched his head. He would have to borrow a few things from the usual regimen of the Beautiful Beasts of Konoha to properly challenge Naruto.

Memories rushed into his head, and he learned that Anko had agreed. Excellent.

"Once again, that's enough Naruto," he said. "Gather round."

When all three of his genin had gathered before him he clapped his hands. "Okay, I've got a pretty good impression of your physical fitness right now. Pinky, your stamina is sub-par for a freshly graduated kunoichi, but getting rid of your diet and training hard should get rid of most of that."

"But sensei, how will I keep my figure?" Sakura asked. All three men looked at her with incredulous expressions.

"We train enough that unless you eat like an Akimichi you won't gain weight," Kakashi replied before the other two could offer scathing words. "I'll introduce you to a well-known kunoichi who is as fond of dango as Naruto is of ramen."

"You mean Anko-nee?" Naruto asked excitedly.

"Yes, Naruto. Anko," Kakashi confirmed.

"SWEET! She's been avoiding me for the past two weeks because she lost a bet and is refusing to pay up," Naruto said with a shark-like grin.

"I don't even _want _to know," Kakashi said in a deadpan. "Moving on. Sasuke, your performance was above-par for a fresh graduate, but nothing truly special. Naruto, your performance was off the charts for a normal fresh graduate, but considering the stamina freaks your mother's side of the family were you performed merely acceptably. To further your training, all three of you will get resistance seals starting tomorrow.

"Do not confuse resistance seals with gravity or weight seals. Gravity and weight seals work by increasing the pull of gravity on an area of the body or increasing the mass of an area of the body, effectively doing the same thing. Resistance seals increase the wind resistance your body naturally suffers from and makes joints harder to move. Most resistance seals come in fourteen levels, and the first level feels similar to walking while completely submerged in water. Level fourteen does not have an adequate description using a natural analogue. Most ninja who use resistance seals do not ever venture beyond five.

"Once in a while, we will deactivate the resistance seals so that your body gets accustomed to the effects of the seal and to ensure that your coordination does not suffer from your increase in speed. It won't do to make yourself faster if you suddenly can't hit your opponent or block his attacks any more. Got that so far?" he asked.

Receiving three nods in reply, though Sakura looked a bit unsure while doing so, he pressed on, "Now for the coordination assessment. While we were talking a clone of mine set up a slalom course. You will each go through the course as fast as you can. Then we will perform stretches and other traditional warming-up and cooling-down exercises before running the slalom again, but this time while walking on one's hands. Then we break for lunch. Any questions so far?"

Three shaking heads were his only answer. "Good!" he replied brightly. "Then follow me."

– – – –

Naruto mulled over his first training day so far while eating the bento provided by sensei before he left. Sasuke was, to the surprise of absolutely no one, the fastest of the three and the most well-coordinated. Interceptor Fist demanded both speed and coordination. Sakura and himself were approximately equal, though he performed better on the course by virtue of his unending stamina that rendered him always as fresh as he was when he woke up, compared to the heavily panting, exhausted Sakura. It was likely this exhaustion that made her eat everything contained within her bento without a fuss.

It was after the stretches between slalom courses that he truly hit the first snag of his ninja career; his balance on something that wasn't his feet was atrocious and he was not able to successfully complete more than three steps while walking on his hands, let alone the entire course. It would come in time.

In a swirl of leaves, Kakashi-sensei and a guest reappeared in the clearing where they started the day. Naruto allowed his eyes to visibly light up – Kitsune illusions were ridiculously flexible – when he recognized the person he was with, not that it was especially hard to do so. The combination of trenchcoat, fishnet shirt, and a Nara-styled ponytail was not exactly common around the village.

"Anko-nee!" he cried happily, attacking her with a flying tackle-hug. "You owe me a hundred ryō!"

"Gaki!" she replied in the same exuberant tone, subtly guiding his flight path so that his face would land between her sizeable breasts. "Where you been the past two weeks?" She steadfastly ignored his mention of her owing him money.

_'Kaa-chan?' _he tentatively called out mentally. They had been playing around with the seal to establish a mental connection even when her consciousness was inside her blood clone, but he was uncertain if it would work outside the yōki-rich environment of the Uzumaki Compound.

'_Yes, musuko-kun? What is it?' _Haha, success!

'_Anko-nee asks where I've been the past two weeks, what do I tell her?' _he replied nervously.

_'Hmm...' _ His mother hummed. '_Invite her over at the end of the day. It'll be good to talk to my surrogate younger sister again.'_

_'_More _surrogate family, kaa-chan? First Kakashi and Obito, now Anko?' _

_'I have a weak spot for suffering orphans, okay?' _his mother replied testily. Naruto frowned lightly. That sounded almost tsundere, but that was ridiculous.

"Oi, gaki! You there?" Anko yelled in his ear, snapping him from the conversation with his mother. "I mean, I can understand if you aren't. Not many men get to be introduced so intimately to the twins," she added in a sultry tone. She either missed or ignored the disgusted expression of Sakura at her words. More likely ignored.

"I can show you. Will you be home at 1830?" he asked, his voice muffled by the above-average mammaries of Mitarashi Anko.

"Yup. You taking me on a date gaki?" she asked cheekily, increasing the force pressing the blond to her body for emphasis.

Naruto turned his blue eyes to lock with her glimmering brown ones, mirth evident in them. "Something like that," he said in his best imitation of her earlier voice. Had they looked closely in another direction, they would have seen an interesting red spot appearing on the facemask of a silver-haired cyclops. Anko briefly looked taken aback that he had returned her flirting before a grin lit her face.

– – – –

Back in the Uzumaki Garden after a rather fruitful meeting with the head of the Hyuuga Main House, Kushina debated the pros and cons of having Anko help with seduction resistance, or if she should contact some of her friends in the Hyuuga to help since Hiashi was nowhere near as mad at her as she thought he had rights to be, or if she would do it herself. As her thoughts took a more... _adult _turn, blood erupted from her nose. If he was anything like his father...

She licked her lips.

– – – –

"As golden as this moment is," the aforementioned cyclops drawled out, "I figured it'd be good for pinky to get the 'dieting for ninja is _bad_' talk from an actual kunoichi. Anko-san here graciously agreed. I've supplied lists with your new nutritional demands and taken the liberty to deposit them at your places of residence."

"Mitarashi Anko at your service!" the woman yelled dramatically before vanishing and re-appearing behind Sakura. "How about you and I have a nice chat, pinky?" she asked, but before Sakura could so much as open her mouth to reply she had already been shoved to her feet. "Now move it, the Dango Empire awaits!" she yelled with a manic grin on her face as she pushed a struggling Sakura along. "MUSH!"

When the last cries of the pink-haired genin had faded into the distance, Sasuke asked, "How is she going to do what the teachers at the Academy never could, sensei?"

Naruto gazed at the black-haired youth, astonishment written on his face at his rather civil tone.

Perhaps he had recognized the fact that their sensei was one of, if not outright, the strongest jōnin in the village and decided that pissing such a person off would be bad because it could mean that he received less than optimal training?

Shaking away his astonishment, he answered in lieu of their sensei. With a grin on his face he asked, "are you aware of my ramen eating habits, Sasuke-teme?"

"I am," he confirmed with a frown. "But I don't see how that is relevant."

"Well," Naruto drawled out in a pretty good imitation of Kakashi, "Anko-nee is the same when it comes to dango. She considers a light appetizer to be approximately seventeen sticks. And you have seen her figure."

"Of course," Sasuke answered calmly, surprising Naruto. Evidently he had seen Naruto's surprise and recognized it for what it was, for he continued hotly, "In spite of popular opinion among the guys at the Academy, I am not gay."

Naruto turned an incredulous eye towards the duck-haired Uchiha. "Who are you and what have you to _my _broody Sasuke-teme?" Naruto demanded.

"Tch," Sasuke replied testily. "Don't push your luck, _dobe_."

"So you _can _be civil!" Naruto exclaimed. Sasuke started to reply in kind, but a cough from Kakashi stopped him short and focused the attention of both genin back to him.

"While pinky is away getting her lecture, we're going to start on a basic chakra control. You are familiar with the concept from the Academy's leaf floating exercise, and the general principle holds. Too much chakra and bad stuff happens, too little chakra and bad stuff happens.

"There is a whole set of exercises out there to improve chakra control, starting small at tree walking – also known as surface-clinging –, and getting bigger with water walking or more generally surface tension manipulation, flow splitting, flow reversal, and immolation aversion. Most people stop after being capable of walking on water unless they are training a wind-element affinity, at which point they continue to flow splitting. As you can imagine, the further along you go, the worse the 'bad stuff' is, up to and including actually dying."

Both genin gulped involuntarily.

"The first exercise, tree walking, is simple in principle," he said as he walked to a nearby tree and placed a foot on its bark. "You channel chakra into your foot to cling to the surface, then walk upwards, alternating the foot you channel chakra to as necessary. The exercise is mastered when you can fight another person for two hours on a vertical surface just as well as you could standing upright." He calmly walked up to what was approximately half-way up the tree and went through a basic Dragon style kata at speeds his students could track. He then proceeded to sedately walk back down to the ground. "Your turn. Do not expect to get this within three days unless you have really good chakra control already," he said, taking the moment to throw a kunai in front of both his students. "Use this to mark your highest position along the tree. One last piece of advice; you want to start out running and only progress to walking up the tree when you have reached the top. I'll put pinky on the same exercise when she gets back."

The two nodded and went to work.

"Naruto," Kakashi said calmly when Naruto was running up the tree, drawing his attention. "I know you can do the exercise already."

"Drat," Naruto cursed softly. "And here I was hoping for an easy first day."

"Yeah," Kakashi drawled. "No. While I acknowledge your desire to keep your skills unknown until circumstances force you, I'm not letting you off easy. **Kage Bunshin no Jutsu**."

A single clone poofed into existence and started gathering rocks and leaves while the original went to do his own workout, taking care to do so in full view of the genin so they could get an idea of what an _actual _ninja workout was.

"Here, hover the rocks over your handpalms and the backs of your hands and rotate the leaves over your fingers with no two adjacent leaves spinning the same direction, all the while maintaining your tree-walking."

The clone turned to face the second genin. "The same goes for you once you have mastered tree-walking. I'll add a few rocks and leaves before we practice water-walking.

"Get to work."

"Hai, sensei," the two said reluctantly. Kakashi noted the jealousy in Sasuke but chose not to speak up for now. That would be addressed during the first week, perhaps during the survival exercise?

The clone withdrew a very familiar orange-covered book from the storage seal in his pouch, and giggles filled the air as the two genin practiced.

– – – –

"Welcome, Mitarashi-sama!" the proprietor of Dangoya – The Best Dango in Hi no Kuni! – greeted her. "And who is this lovely young lady?" he asked with a courteous bow.

"This is me paying a favour and attempting to rid the world of a Fangirl at the same time," Anko replied with an audible capital letter 'F'.

"Gaki," she said to Sakura in her best intimidatory tone, "go find a seat."

It should be said that given her occupation as the Assistant Head of T&I, the best intimidatory tone Anko could wield was a _very effective _intimidatory tone. With a frightened squeak that brightened this day in the life of Mitarashi Anko, Sakura scarpered to a nearby seat.

"I want my usual delivered to that table," she said to the proprietor with a finger pointing to the table the pink-haired genin had seated herself at. "Don't bother with more than a single plate for her."

"Of course, Mitarashi-sama," the proprietor said with a bow before disappearing in the direction of the kitchen.

Anko set herself in front of pinky, Haruno something or other, at the other side of the table, a slight grin on her face. Pinky looked nervous at her grin, but Anko could not find a reason why. She made an effort to reduce the normal bloodlust in her grins just for this occasion!

Kakashi wanted her to lecture his student about the dangers of dieting, so she would. "Calm down, gaki," she said imperiously. She could not lecture pinky if pinky ran away, no?

"Then don't grin like that!" pinky half-yelled.

She allowed her grin to return to its normal level of bloodlust. Pinky squeaked and Anko considered her point made, returning the grin to its toned-down level.

"Now listen up, gaki," she said, waving a dango skewer from the last time she visited Dangoya... all of two hours ago... in the air between them. "Kakashi tells me you've been dieting."

"Yes, so what?" she asked testily, and Anko grinned. _So there _is _some fire to this girl! "_I need to keep my figure for Sasuke-kun!" she exclaimed with hearts in her eyes, and Anko lost what little respect she had gained.

"Gaki," she said seriously. "Look at me."

She stood up and ditched her trenchcoat, revealing her stunning figure to the world. Most men in the establishment passed out almost immediately from blood loss. The few that did not were Anko's usual waiter and the proprietor, who had seen her do something provocative way too often to be really affected anymore.

Just as well, really. Anko would not have liked it if the plates of Nirvana the waiter was carrying were dropped onto the floor. She had put fools in the hospital for less.

"Your dango, Mitarashi-sama," the waiter said with a bow, putting no less than seven plates, upon which lay twenty-eight sticks of Heaven, in front of her. Anko grinned.

"Thanks," she said as she sat back down and started eating.

"Do you have no shame?" pinky asked incredulously. "Or table manners, for that matter," she added once she saw how Anko wolfed down her dango. It reminded her of how Naruto used to eat ramen during Academy lunch break before Yuuhi Kurenai quite literally pounded some table manners into him.

"Shame gets people killed, gaki," she said seriously and a shocked expression briefly flitted across pinky's face. "I trained in the nude often regardless of the presence of others of either gender to get rid of any shyness about my body. If not, someone could just rip your top open and you'd be dead faster than you could say 'hey'."

It was probably a good thing that she was talking at a normal volume or Dangoya would have another wave of bloodloss-induced incapacitations.

"The point is, however," Anko continued without waiting for pinky to talk back, "did you see the reaction of the men in the shop just now?"

"Yes," pinky said in distaste even. "Filthy perverts."

"Exactly," she said as she grabbed her third plate. "Now, what am I eating?"

"Dango," pinky said flatly. "Lots and lots of dango."

"Ding ding ding! – _scrunch – _ Give gaki a prize!" Anko exclaimed. "Now, I'll admit dango is not the healthiest of foods, despite it being far and away the most delicious _no matter what __any__ blond gaki says_. However, I still eat 'round about sixty to seventy sticks _per day,_ if I'm not otherwise indisposed."

Pinky's eyes widened as Anko re-donned her jacket. "Per day?"

"Correct, Haruno-san," the proprietor said while walking back to the kitchen from an order placed by another table. His establishment wasn't so large that he could focus on management to the exclusion of all else, much like his friend Teuchi and his ramen stand. "Mitarashi-sama is far and away our best customer and we always lament it when she is sent on missions that take her away from the village."

"I see," pinky said in that tone that indicated that she had done the exact opposite. "Then how do you keep that figure?"

"Training, gaki," she replied. "As kunoichi, we can eat whatever we want, however much we want, as long as we ensure that we get at least a minimum of everything. The rest we burn off with training."

She waved a dango skewer in the air between them with a thoughtful expression on her face. "Since I've got you now, that's exactly what we'll be doing after I finish here." Her expression became filled with a murderous glee. "Kakashi told me that you'll be introduced to tree-walking today, and I have _just _the thing needed to convince you to walk trees."

Sakura turned an apprehensive eye towards the purple-haired kunoichi of questionable sanity. "And that thing is?" she asked hesitantly.

"**Sen'eijashu!**" Anko exclaimed and a single snake burst from her sleeve to land on the table. Sakura leaped up with a shrill scream of fright. "Say hello to Kraitler-chan!" she said enthusiastically.

"Kraitler-chan, this is Haruno Sakura, otherwise known as 'pinky'. You'll get to help me train her for _at least _an afternoon, maybe more if Kakashi agrees."

"_How ssso, Anko-sssama?_"

"Pinky here is going to be start to learn tree-walking today. You've got pretty much carte blanche except for biting to..." she trailed off, looking for the proper word. "_Facilitate_," she eventually continued, "the exercise."

"_I await sssuch a moment with anticccipation, Anko-sssama. It isss alwaysss fun to ssscare two-legsss." _

Anko grinned a very feral grin. "I thought you'd see it like me. I'll call you again when we're at the training ground, I have dango to eat."

"_I ssshall wait with bated breath, Anko-sssama." _

In a poof of smoke, the snake disappeared from the table.

Sakura calmed down and took her sweet time to re-seat herself. Inner Sakura was sweating bullets at the display. _'I think we'd better run, shannaro!' _Sakura agreed with her inner self, but was fairly certain that the crazy woman would be able to catch her before she reached the door.

"Will you require refills, Mitarashi-sama?" a waiter asked as Anko was happily finishing her dango, currently cleaning her seventh plate.

"No," she answered. "As much as I hate not ordering more dango, gaki and I have things to do, places to be, y'know?"

"Naturally, Mitarashi-sama," the waiter replied good-naturedly. "We look forward to your next visit, Mitarash-sama."

The pair spent the next few seconds in silence while Anko ate her dango, and then decided to eat the uneaten dango on Sakura's plate.

No sense wasting good dango.

Anko patted her stomach. "Aaah, dango is always good," Anko said in a breathy voice before she rose from her seat. "Come on, gaki. Let's go."

Sakura hesitated while Anko walked towards the door, not wanting to spend more time with the woman who was practically radiating bloodlust even when she was fairly calm. Apparently she had taken too long, for the aforementioned woman hurled a kunai in her direction that left a thin scratch on her cheek and suddenly appeared behind her, collecting the blood on a finger before licking that finger with a sensual moan that caused a renewed round of nosebleeds from the male patronage of Dangoya.

"Absolutely delicious," she said breathily. "Blood laced with fear is always so very tasty."

She pierced Sakura with a frightening glance and lifted the pink-haired girl to her feet. "Now, as I said, gaki... let's _go._ MUSH!"

With a frightened yelp, Sakura jumped up and practically flew out of Dangoya, a purple-haired kunoichi hot on her heels.

– – – –

After she had escaped Anko at five, Sakura had returned to her earlier training ground only to be set the same exercise she had just been doing for a few hours, and infinitely preferred the methods Kakashi-sensei employed. She could not deny that her hours under Anko-san were _effective _though. Having a venomous constrictor snake, something unique to the Snake Summons, waiting at the base of the tree in case she failed the exercise was one hell of a motivator. Compared to that, Kakashi, who had seemed so harsh earlier, was like paradise on Earth.

At six-fifteen, fifteen minutes after Kakashi had dismissed them for the day, Sakura limped inside her house where her mother was working her magic in the kitchen.

"Hello sweetie," her mother called from the kitchen. "How was your day?"

"Strenuous," she replied as she sat herself down at the table. "How long until dinner is ready? I feel like I could eat a herd of horses and still have room for more."

"Weren't you on a diet to impress Uchiha-san?" her mother asked curiously.

"I spent almost five hours training with Mitarashi Anko," she said in a dead voice. "More specifically, I spent lunch and an after-lunch training session with Anko. She eats dango like Naruto-baka eats ramen."

"Anko..." her mother said, her voice trailing off in thought. "Purple hair done Nara-style, Bloodthirsty, crazy, and a body I would kill to have?"

"Dunno about the last, kaa-san, but the first three are correct."

"Ah. That'll do it," her mother answered as her mother started to set the table.

"How can you be so calm, kaa-san?"

"I used to be a kunoichi myself for a few years before I had an accident that permanently burned out my chakra coils, remember?" her mother said. "I could have told you myself that dieting wasn't going to do you much good in the ninja world, but the few times I tried to broach the subject you were so confident you knew better."

Sakura blushed. "What about Kakashi-sensei mentioning that ninja need to eat 3 500 kilocalories per day? That can't be true, right?"

"It's not," her mother answered curtly, and a satisfied expression appeared on Sakura's face before it was wiped off and replaced with a shocked expression at her mother's next words. "Back when I was a kunoichi, I ate an average of 5 000 kilocalories per day, often breaching ten on particularly intensive training days."

Her mother appeared briefly from the kitchen to wave a ladle in Sakura's general direction with a stern expression on her face. "And let me tell you my dear, I didn't look half bad back in the day. Not up to Anko's level, but I had little fat, a sizeable bust that left many a man drooling, and an ass that I allowed Jiraiya-sama to use in his novels after your father passed on." She looked down at her chest with a sad expression. "I wonder where my boobs have gone the past decade. Though sometimes it seems like they simply moved to supplement my ass."

"MOM!" Sakura yelled with a massive blush on her face from her mother's frank words.

"So now that you have seen the truth of the culinary world and its effects on a ninja's body, it's time I gave you something I would otherwise have given you two years ago when you had your first period."

Sakura gulped at the grin that had appeared on her mother's face.

"But first, dinner!" she said excitedly while clapping her hands. "A nice steak with boiled potatoes and beans. Nothing special, but it gets the job done." At her daughter's look, she simply said, "I remember my first training day, Sakura-chan. I _literally _ate a dozen steaks," with a sheepish expression on her face. "So I prepared accordingly."

For the next half hour, the only sound they made was the tinkling of cutlery on plates as they ate. When they were done and had cleaned the table, washed the dishes, and poured themselves a drink, Haruno Mebuki forcefully pulled her daughter onto the couch and sat herself next to her daughter, wrapping an arm around the younger pink-haired woman's shoulders with a near-manic grin on her face.

Sakura gulped. That particular grin on her mother's face _never _meant anything good...

"Now, when a boy and girl _like _each other..."

– – – –

"Heya Anko-nee! Yuugao-nee! Kurenai-nee!" Naruto said excitedly as he knocked on the door of the Snake Den, as Anko called her apartment. Over the years since her return after Orochimaru's betrayal, her two closest friends Uzuki Yuugao – known to some as ANBU-taichō Neko – and Yuuhi Kurenai – the Genjutsu Mistress of Konoha, not that that title held as much import as it did when the Uchiha and Kurama clans were still abundant – moved in with her, and after Yuugao had come to the scene at his apartment four years ago he had become an unofficial fourth resident, a position many men in Konoha would kill to be in.

The Ice Queens, as the three were also known, were considered to be the three most beautiful women in the village and he had seen each and every one of them half-naked at some point, though he did not pass out from a nosebleed at the sight because his hormones hadn't kicked in yet.

"Hey there, Naruto-kun," Yuugao said as she held open the door to allow him entry. "How have you been?"

"Pretty good, all things considered," he answered. "Kakashi-sensei is a slave driver."

"Oh?" Yuugao said, surprise evident in her voice. "The Laziest Non-Nara of Konoha is a slave-driver?" Yuugao tried to reconcile his words with her image of the perpetually tardy jōnin, to little success. "Somehow I can't imagine that."

"Yeah, well..." Naruto began as Kurenai entered the living room with Anko, carrying a large plate laden with small snacks. The mixed scent of crackers with salmon, crackers with various cheeses, onigiri, freshly grilled yakitori, and dorayaki filled the room. "He said he was ordered by Hokage-sama to step up his game, shake the rust off." Naruto shrugged, and missed the glances the three shared.

Kurenai simply asked, "Candidate?" as Anko and herself set the plate down.

"Candidate," the other two replied curtly. Naruto looked between them with a confused expression on his face that made the other three have to resist hugging him with a squeal of 'kawaii'.

"What are you on about?" he asked.

"Nothing you should be worried about, Naruto-kun," Yuugao replied. "At least, not until you become a chuunin and by then it'll likely be common knowledge."

"If you say so, Yuugao-nee."

They each grabbed a small snack, and Kurenai turned to Naruto. "So, Naruto-kun," she began, "what are you doing here?"

Anko answered for him. "Gaki told me he'd show me where he was the past two weeks."

Yuugao and Kurenai sat up slightly straighter. "Oh, did he now?" they asked in unison with a hint of something in their eyes that told Naruto quite clearly that if they didn't get to come along they would tort... put him through training. He gulped and reached out through the seal to his mother.

_'Kaa-chan?'_

_'Yes, musuko-kun?' _

_'Is it alright if I bring Uzuki Yuugao and Yuuhi Kurenai along with Anko?' _

_'My old kawaii genin! Please do!' _

Naruto allowed his expression to fall into a deadpan, causing the three women around him to wonder what was up. "He was like this at noon too, all out of it," Anko said.

'_Do you know _everyone _in the village, kaa-chan?' _

_'Not everyone,_' she replied teasingly. '_Just everyone of importance.' _

"OI, GAKI!" Anko yelled, snapping Naruto out of his conversation. "You spaced out again. What gives?"

He coughed. "Mental communication seal," he explained shortly, and three eyebrows belonging to three different persons rose to meet three hairlines. He squirmed under the scrutiny.

"I'll explain in detail later, when we're there."

Neither of them pressed him for explaining where 'there' was, figuring they'd find out soon.

"So that means 'Nai-chan and Yuu-chan can join, yeah?" Anko inquired.

"Yes," he replied shortly.

"SWEET!" Anko said jubilantly as she jumped out of her chair and marched towards the door. "Let's GO!"

The three remaining inside just looked at her retreating back and waited patiently.

"Ten ryō says five minutes," Naruto said into the silence.

"Deal," Yuugao said. "Kurenai?"

Kurenai pursed her lips. "You know I don't like gambling."

"Fine," Naruto said peaceably. The three settled down to wait.

Exactly five minutes later, Anko re-appeared in the doorway with a sheepish grin on her face and Yuugao grumbled as she handed ten ryō to Naruto.

"Soo..." Anko trailed off. "Naruto, lead the way?"

Soft laughter from three sources filled the apartment. This was from the first, or even hundredth time Anko did something like this, but it never got old.

"Yeah yeah, laugh it up," Anko said without much vitriol. "Shall we, gaki?"

"Let's," he agreed. "First stop, Training Ground 43."

– – – –

"These are some pretty weird plants, Naruto-kun," Yuugao said before something caught her eye. "Is that the castor oil plant?"

"It is, though it's been mutated by exposure to non-human chakra," he explained, drawing three inquiring looks. "All will be explained later."

"In addition," he continued with nary a missed beat, "This garden contains mutated almonds, various plants not native to the Elemental Nations, numerous other poisonous plants native to at least one of the Elemental Nations and a few plants that are actually very edible, even to full humans."

"So that's where Inoichi got his new stock from," Anko said with a 'eureka' tone.

"Full humans?" Kurenai asked curiously, the words having stood out to her. Naruto waved dismissively.

"Like I said, it'll be clear shortly."

With that, he walked up to the traditional shogi door and slid it open before pausing in the doorway. With a flex of his chakra, the illusion hiding his tails and ears vanished and three squeals rang through the air. Not even the hardened jōnin were completely immune to the kawaii instinct all females seemed to possess.

_I should have foreseen this, _Naruto thought as he felt the three women hugging him and stroking his tails. He shuddered. His tails were _sensitive_, and the base of them was apparently an erogenous spot according to his mother.

"..."

"A..."

"I think gaki wants to say something, Yuu-chan," Anko said from where she was hugging, stroking, and cuddling with two of the seven tails.

"Air!" he finally gasped out, and the two women hugging his torso released him with sheepish expressions on their faces. A brief flash lit up the scene.

"Prime blackmail material, musuko-kun," the previously unnoticed figure standing before them said.

He felt more than saw the other three completely freeze.

Anko, Kurenai, and Yuugao could not believe their eyes. There, in the doorway, stood the woman who was in many ways more a family member than their actual blood relations.

"Sensei?"

"Kushina-nee?" Anko got out, barely managing to stop stuttering. She was the Assistant Head of T&I damnit, she did not stutter!

Kushina spread her arms, inviting Anko for a hug. It didn't take long for Anko to take a shaky step forward, rub her eyes, and then tackle-hug the red-haired woman, burying her head in the crook of the older woman's neck. Sobs filled the atmosphere, and Naruto swiftly went inside in almost complete silence.

"Nee-chan," Anko said in a voice filled with a bevy of emotions. "Where were you the last decade?"

In response, all Kushina did was remove the illusion hiding her tails and wrap the nine previously hidden tails around Anko. Anko didn't notice, but two other two did.

"Sensei," Yuugao uttered, hurt evident in her voice. "Why did you never tell us you were the Kyuubi?"

"Because the Bijuu don't have the best of reputations in the Elemental Nations," Kushina said softly, nearly purring under Anko's fresh assault on fluffy tails now that she had noticed them and drawn her own conclusions. "Minato-kun knew, Jiraiya-sama knew, Tsunade-sensei knew, and a few Hyuuga knew. Not even Sandaime-sama knew until a week and a half ago, nor did Kakashi-kun until yesterday."

"I see," Yuugao said softly, placated, before she too rushed forward and joined the hug her sensei had with Anko. Kurenai followed not long after.

"I guess I owe you an explanation, don't I?" Kushina said after a few minutes of just standing there with her tails wrapped around all three of the younger women. "Let's go inside, this is going to take a while..."

– – – –

**Translations: **

**Sen'eijashu: Hidden Shadow Snake Hands.**

**Kawaii: cute.**

**Gaki: brat.**

– – – –

**A/N: The name of Anko's snake is a shout-out to The Tragedy of Repetition, by SoulShdw, a fic I enjoyed. **

**I decided to go with the fact that, while inspiring words may be remembered forever, what truly makes people change is _seeing _something. Specifically, the masturbatory material that is Anko's body with her habits of eating. As for the proprietor, his shop isn't _that _big that he can spend all his time doing paperwork, much like Teuchi is the proprietor and chief chef of Ichiraku Ramen.**

**Also, because people asked, here's a quick review of ages that are relevant or may become relevant in the future.**

**Naruto is twelve, as are the Rookie Nine (who may remain the Rookie Nine depending on my decisions pertaining Sasuke). The three that complete the Konoha 11 (or 12) are a year older.**

**Yuugao is 22**

**Anko is 24**

**Kakashi is 26, as are Gai and Asuma**

**Kurenai is 27 as of two days ago in the fic**

**Kushina is 110, though in human form she is 38 (this is including time spent inside the seal, her human form was 26 when she was sealed), and looks 24. This makes Kushina almost exactly six years older than the Uzumaki Mito of this fic.**

**Kurenai failed her first go at the chuunin exams and was placed on a team with Yuugao under Kushina after Kushina's original line up had one member graduate. In this story, the Chuunin exams were put into place somewhere before the third lustrum of the Shinobi Villages. **

**Yes, that does mean that Kakashi has a parental relationship with someone only slightly more than a decade his elder. That's just how messed up Kakashi's life is. **

**Lastly; many, many fanfics have Sakura's mother on the Civilian Council. I got tired of reading such, so she isn't one here. In addition, while the council in this fic started off as fanon it got curbed heavily even before the first chapter was over. If you're looking for an Uchiha-loving Council... forget it. **

**Do remember that last chapter mentioned nothing about the Council threatening Kakashi if he failed the Uchiha, and it's not as if Kakashi has much of a life outside missions and icha icha before he became a sensei.**

**Inspiration for the training scene came from Dark Angel of Auralon's 'Dark Phoenix of Konoha'. There's a fair bit of cliché in that fic and a few headscratchers (Scrolls with clan techniques do not end up in the open garbage, they get incinerated on the spot to prevent clan secrets from leaking out. They are ninja, and do not lack common sense), but it provided a good template for Competent!Kakashi, so it gets a mention.**

**I can only hope that I did Anko's character justice.**

**Next chapter will feature some more training (though not too much), and Team Seven's first D-rank, which will, naturally, be Tora.**

**Because a fic just isn't complete without at least one Tora mission.**


End file.
